Will M. Helixon – The Man Behind the Military Lawyer – Autobiography

Personal Life Experiences Shape Perspective and World View

Every individual’s perspective on professional and personal issues is shaped by various factors, such as training, education, personality, spirituality, and, perhaps most significantly, life experiences. These experiences begin even before birth, influenced by the experiences of one’s parents during the formative early years. However, as individuals grow, mature, and navigate through life, the influence of parents gradually gives way to personal experiences, events, and happenings.

Personal experiences form the foundation upon which all other things are viewed, serving as the lens through which an individual sees the world. Consequently, it becomes crucial to familiarize yourself with a military attorney’s background and personal experiences to assess how they will interpret the law, the facts of your case, and the best approaches to defending you. If your attorney has led a sheltered life devoid of adversity or hardship, how can they comprehend how to investigate, build, and present a strong mitigation case to minimize potential punishment or adverse consequences? Likewise, if they haven’t faced and overcome obstacles, personal difficulties, tragedies, or setbacks, how can they empathize with the difficulties you encountered when making the decision that led to your current legal problems? In essence, understanding your military attorney’s life experiences is essential for effectively evaluating their ability to fully comprehend, appreciate, and articulate both the merits and mitigation/extenuation aspects of your case.

My Wife Ebru Choice

I am married to Ebru Choice, and we tied the knot in Alvarado, Texas, on February 20, 2021. We have been dating since January 26, 2018, and living together in Germany since June 19, 2018.  Our wedding ceremony was officiated by my son John at his house. Ebru was the driving force behind my efforts and ultimate success in getting sober.  While nobody will achieve sobriety unless they do it for themselves, Ebru made it much easier by providing unimaginable support every step of the way.  She quit drinking the day I agreed to go to rehab in May 2019, and has not touched alcohol since in an effort to support me.  Even when I stumbled, and needed to get up and dust myself off to keep walking down the path of sobriety, she walked with me, step-by-step.  I put her through hell during the height of my addiction to alcohol.  When others would have turned and ran away as fast as they could, Ebru stood by me, and patently helped me discover the joy of sobriety.  She literally saved my life.

My Stepsons Devante and Deandre

Together with Ebru, I am also a stepfather to her two sons, Devante, and Deandre. Both currently reside with us in Germany. They recently completed their bachelor’s studies, and both are awaiting the results of their bachelor’s thesis. Devante focused on economics and marketing, particularly on movie marketing strategies on social media, while studying at a university in Weiden, Germany. Deandre specialized in media technology and engineering with a focus on animation at a university in Amberg, Germany.

Our House in Vilseck, Germany

Ebru and I have established our home in Sorghoff, Germany (population of 800), which is conveniently located just a three-minute drive from Rose Barracks, home to the Second Cavalry Regiment, U.S. Army, and other stationed units in Vilseck. Rose Barracks (Vilseck) is situated on the southeast side Grafenwoehr Training Area (GTA) and approximately 20 minutes away from Tower Barracks (Grafenwoehr), which is on the northeast side of the training area. The Grafenwoehr Training Area spans 232 square kilometers (90 square miles) or 52,000 acres. Sorghoff is considered part of Vilseck (population of 6,500) which is situated about 45 minutes east of Nurnberg, closer to the border with the Czech Republic.

Our Apartment in Wiesbaden, Germany

In July of 2021, Ebru was hired by the Criminal Investigation Division (CID) of the U.S. Army to work as a Special Agent on U.S. Army Clay Kaserne in Wiesbaden, Germany.  Wiesbaden is in the German state of Hessen and is about three-hours and thirty minutes away from our house in Sorghoff, about 330 kilometers, or 205 miles west of Sorghoff/Vilseck.  Wiesbaden is a city of over 275,000 residents and is about 20 minutes from Frankfurt International Airport.  In the United States, it could be considered a suburb of Frankfurt (population of 750,000), which is about 38 kilometers away or about 30 minutes by car.  We have two apartments on the Walking Platz of Wiesbaden, about 200 meters apart.  We use the large three-bedroom apartment for our residence when we are in Wiesbaden, and I use the other one-bedroom apartment as my downtown law office.  Both the apartment and office are located on the Walking Platz of Wiesbaden and are in the heart of Wiesbaden’s city center.  We currently live during the weekdays in Wiesbaden and spend most weekends in Sorghoff.

Law Office of Will M. Helixon in Vilseck, Germany

Located conveniently right off post in Vilseck, the Law Office of Will M. Helixon maintains an office in Vilseck.  In the modern era of the practice of law, much of the client interaction can be done remotely through videoconferencing, telephone, and texting.  It is a rare occurrence when a physical meeting is needed, this is especially true in the post-COVID world when remote interaction has become commonplace, and even preferred in many instances. When it is necessary to meet face-to-face, in an environment that demands the privacy of an office, our military lawyers can meet you at our Vilseck office for your convenience.

Law Office of Will M. Helixon in Wiesbaden, Germany

For the convenience of Soldiers not stationed in the Grafenwoehr and Vilseck area, the Law Office of Will M. Helixon also maintains an office on the Walking Platz in downtown Wiesbaden.  Conveniently located, the office is available when necessary to conduct private business that can not be handled through other means.  With a spectacular view of the main cathedral downtown and an easy entrance next to L’Osterial restaurant, our fourth floor Wiesbaden office will meet any client needs in Wiesbaden.

My Parents

My Father – Michael Leon Helixon

My father, Michael Leon Helixon, was born on February 3, 1943, in Waukegan, Illinois, to Raymond and Mathilda Helixon. Raymond, my grandfather, had a college education and was a former professional baseball player for ten years before joining Johnson Outboard Motors Company in Waukegan. One of the baseball teams he played for at the end of his career was the House of David.  My grandmother, affectionately known as “Tillie,” worked various jobs at department stores to contribute to the household before becoming a mother. My father had a younger sister named Sharon. Growing up in a Roman Catholic household, discipline was strict, and my grandmother ruled with an iron fist. Unfortunately, physical discipline was commonplace and, according to my Aunt Sharon, it often crossed the line into abuse. Despite this challenging upbringing, my father excelled in school and earned acceptance to the prestigious Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) after graduating from Catholic high school. However, he faced difficulties during his first year at MIT and decided to change his major from chemical engineering to packaging engineering. He subsequently transferred to Michigan State University, renowned as the top university in the nation for packaging sciences, to pursue his chosen field of study.

My Mother – Sue Lynne Andersen

My mother, Sue Lynne Andersen, was adopted as an infant by Guy and Helen Andersen of Reed City, Michigan. She was born on March 6, 1944. My grandfather, Guy, started as an oil field roughneck and worked his way up to management in the oil business. By the time they adopted my mother, Guy and Helen were living an upper-middle-class lifestyle, providing her with everything she could want and more. As an average student growing up, my mother often grappled with curiosity about her adoption and why she wasn’t wanted as a child. Although she didn’t dwell on this fact constantly, it affected her self-esteem and self-image throughout her life. Later in life, with my brother’s assistance in 1993 or 1994, my mother was able to discover her birth parents and learn that she had three living sisters. During high school, my mother aspired to become a teacher, leading her to attend Michigan State University, where she eventually crossed paths with my father.

My Birth:  William Michael Helixon

According to their story, my parents met at Michigan State University. They didn’t have an extended dating period or courtship; rather, it seemed they only knew each other for a relatively short time before my mother became pregnant with me. As my father recalls, they attended a party and went on a few dates but weren’t officially in a committed relationship. Following the pregnancy, my parents married on May 23, 1964, in a formal church wedding. I was born a week early on December 17, 1964, in East Lansing, Michigan, to a 20-year-old mother and a 21-year-old father.  I learned later in life from both of my parents, that had abortion been legal and available in 1964, I likely would never have been born.

My Children

Throughout my life, I have been married five times. My marriages were to Kirsten Jordan in 1985, Janet Dodd in 1990, Kendall Hennas in 1996, Nadia Gabrić in 2001, and most recently, Ebru Choice in 2021. From these marriages, I have two children, and a child from a woman I did not marry. My oldest child, John, was born in 1983. He is married to Mindy, and they have a son named Blayne, who in 2023 was 10 years old. My second child, Lauren, was born in 1987 and is married to Tony. Although they do not have children together, Lauren is a stepmother to Tony’s two children, Taylor and Trace, who are both pursuing higher education. Lastly, my youngest child, Niko, was born in 2002. He is currently a senior studying psychology and Japanese at the University of Kansas (KU) and is unmarried.

My Son John (1983)

John was born during my senior year in high school.  His mother and I kept my identity a secret for a variety of reasons — one of them was out of fear of what her father would do if he found out.  As a result, I never accepted any responsibility for John, or frankly acknowledged him throughout my life.  Several years later, when his mother came to me for help, I was not available.  I was too wrapped up in my separate life, not interested in becoming a part of his life, and disrupting my life and jeopardizing my future plans — I was a successful officer in the U.S. Army and John did not fit into my vision of my future.  Although I told my wife at the time about John, she too was not interested in having anything to do with him, or even acknowledging that he existed. When you add my heavy drinking and alcoholism to the mix, I was able to keep any thoughts of John suppressed.  Remember, alcoholism’s effect is extreme selfishness and self-centeredness — and I had no room for anyone outside of myself.

When I met Ebru and told her about John, she without hesitation said that I should make efforts to reconcile with him, at this time he would have been 35 years old.  After I acknowledged I was an alcoholic and made real efforts at recovery by going to treatment, was the first time I seriously contemplated reconciliation.

Part of the recovery process is making a fearless and searching moral inventory of yourself — and at the top of my inventory was how I had abandoned John.  I knew I could not disrupt John’s life just to make me feel better — that would be selfish and unfair to him and his family.  On the other hand, I had no idea whether he would want to know my identity, much less want to get to no me.  I worked through his mother to determine what she thought, and what the best what was the best way to proceed.  I felt it was best to let John make the decision whether he wanted to know who I was and whether he was interested in pursuing any type of relationship.  It was agreed that we would meet for coffee and have a conversation.  This was the most difficult thing I have done in my life.  I was completely coming from a position of weakness and powerlessness, something that rarely has happened in my life.  I knew I had to make amends for my abandonment for his entire life, but I did not know whether he wanted me to or not.  The bottom line was to make initial contact, and see what happened next.  This happened in 2019 and over the course of the next few years we had ups and downs — it is difficult to get to know someone who you neglected for a lifetime.  Furthermore, how was I supposed to behave?  Through faith, perseverance, and time, I have grown to really like John and desire to get to know him better all the time.  While I am far from perfect, my sobriety has allowed me to see what is really important in life, and working on this relationship is certainly on that list.  Today, John and I talk frequently, and we have visited regularly, although not nearly as much as would like — partially because I live in Germany.  I can honestly say without Ebru and my sobriety, John would still be a stranger to me.  I am grateful I know him and our relationship continues to grow daily.

My Daughter Lauren (1987)

Lauren’s mother and I divorced before Lauren was one-year old.  Again, the common theme throughout much of my life was selfishness and self-centeredness.  Her mother and I were both students at the University of North Texas at the time, and our lives had never really grown together.  We individually pursued our individual goals, and when the marriage was an impediment to achieving my goals, it was expendable. Blame it on my youthfulness, or my daily use of marijuana, or simply on my concern for only myself.  But the bottom line remains that it affected my daughter Lauren.  As a result of my decisions, my visitation with her was very limited, and at first required to be supervised.  When I joined the Army in 1996, and was shipped all over the United States and the world, it became impossible to see Lauren on a regular basis — and I was terrible at keeping in good regular contact.  We were able to go on a few vacations together, and she visited me in Germany a few times, but we did not have regular contact, and did not develop that strong father/daughter bond.  I had virtually nothing to do in her upbringing, and really did not become active in her life until she was an adult.  Even today, I don’t see her frequently enough, and we could always talk to each other more.  My sobriety has refocused my attentions on building my relationship with her, and continuing to grow as a father and daughter should.  She is an outstanding, compassionate, and motivated woman, who is a great wife and stepmother,

My Son Niko (2002)

After not getting it right with John and Lauren, I was determined to be a better father for my son Niko.  And while I thought I was doing a good job, in retrospect I could have done much better.  Although I was around most of his childhood, I was not present.  In addition to deploying to Afghanistan for 16 months while he was in second grade, when I was home, I was rarely present.  I was either working extreme hours putting my career first, or I was traveling as part of my job.  From the time I returned from Afghanistan in 2008, my jobs required me to travel well over 100 days a year — and when I was at home, I was usually buzzed or drunk from alcohol — still in denial that I was an alcoholic.  When I was not drinking, I was laser focused on preparing my cases for trial, interviewing and preparing witness, investigating cases, and generally working late at night, often times until after he went to bed.  When I got off of active duty in 2014, I started my firm in late 2015, and dedicated all of my time to either building the practice or representing clients — what sacrificed was the time I should have been spending with Niko.  During the summer before his 11th grade, I moved out and began the process of getting divorced from his mother — this only drove a wedge in our already somewhat distant relationship.  Since then, but especially when when I was at the height of my alcoholism, I was consumed with myself and did not have time for anyone or anything else.  Sobriety has taught me the painful lesson that you just can’t go back to normal after you stop drinking — it takes effort, dedication, and the commitment of time, all of which is extraordinarily difficult while living on different continents.  A senior at the University of Kansas studying Japanese and psychology, I hope to continue to improve my relationship with Niko and be there for him whenever he needs me.  My commitment is to work everyday to be a better father and role model for Niko — he deserves nothing less.

My Siblings and other Family Background

I was born in 1964, and today, all of my grandparents and parents are deceased.  My dad died in 2014 at the age of 71, and mom died in 2018, at the age of 74. I have one living Aunt, Sharon, who is in her mid-seventies.  My grandfather Raymond was the oldest of nine children, and each of whom are now deceased.  However, they all have left a line of children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren, which have developed and grown throughout the United States and Europe.  If a person has the last name of “Helixon” spelled the same way, we are directly related.

I am the eldest among my siblings. I have a brother named Doug (1966), who shares the same biological parents as me. Additionally, I have a sister named Angela (1973), who shares the same mother but has a different father. Lastly, I have a sister named Heather (1981), who shares the same father but has a different mother. Heather’s birth was a challenging one as she arrived prematurely, weighing barely over a pound. Her early arrival necessitated her stay in the neonatal intensive care unit at a Fort Worth hospital. It was “touch and go” whether she would survive being born so prematurely, but she showed tremendous resilience.

Doug has been married once, to Desire since 1992, and they have an adult daughter named Morgan who graduated from college in 2022.  Angela, on the other hand, has been married twice. Angela has two stepsons from her first marriage, Nicholas and Christopher, and three children with her then-husband Mark; Kyle, Kaleb and Keven. Angela married her current wife, Shannon, in October 2012.  As for Heather, she has been married to Daniel since 2004, and they have two children, Braylon and Madison.

In addition to my siblings, I also have three stepsiblings named Tosha Bancroft, Tabitha Bancroft , and Ross Bancroft, Jr., who all have children. After my mother and stepfather Ross, Sr., divorced in the early-1980s, I’ve only remained in contact with Tosha.

My Brother Doug, his Wife Desire, and Daughter Morgan

My Sister Angela (Angie) and her Wife Shannon

My Sister Heather, her Husband Daniel, and their children

Other Members of the Helixon Clan

Not the Best Big Brother

I must admit that I have been pretty selfish during my life, and not developed as strong of a relationship with my siblings or distant relatives as I would have liked.  Part of this selfishness grew out of my single-mindedness to get an education and become a lawyer.  Some of it grew out of the fact that my siblings and me did not spend our entire childhood growing up under the same roof, with the same parents.  Some of it grew out of the age difference, I am nine years older than my sister Angela, and I am 15 years older than Heather and never lived with her in my entire life.  Doug and I often did not live together, spending time with the other parents when we were growing up.  When we did live together, it seemed as if our parents loved to pit us against each other, and often treated me better than him if for the simple reason I was the first born.  As I matured into my adulthood, we all lived in different parts of the country and world.  When I joined the Army, I spent most of my career overseas, making it very difficult to cultivate that special and deep relationship that many siblings share.  When you add my past alcoholism to the mix, the recipe for strong family team building was simply absent.  I have many regrets in my life, but one of the enduring regrets that I have is not having the bond with my siblings, especially my brother, that defines a family.  With my sobriety, one of the things I hope to improve on in my life is my relationship with my siblings – the other is the relationship I have with my children.

Man’s Best Friend – King Richard (Richey)

So in late 2018 it was recommended to me to get a dog to assist with my anxiety and depression.  Before that time, I had always considered myself a cat person.  We got Richey in early December 2018 as a super young puppy.  It was only a matter of days before he stole my heart.  Richey is the most loving, affectionate, and compassionate dog you could wish for — he greatly reduced my anxiety and immediately improved my mood.  Ebru works about 12-hours a day, and I am home alone, other than Richey.  He makes life so much better.  Without a doubt, my healing process from depression, anxiety, and PTSD, has been much better with Richey around all the time.  I cannot imagine what I would do without him.

The Story of My Life: Trauma, Drive, Ambition, Success, and my Battle with Alcoholism From the Start

What follows is a synopsis of my life — it is not a complete autobiography chalked full of details from every stage of my life, but rather an overview painted with broad strokes to give the reader a glimpse into my life — exposing the difficulties, obstacles, hardships, opportunities, efforts to better myself, successes, failures, strengths, weaknesses, and vulnerabilities of my personal and professional life.  The synopsis of my life should give you the insight to understand where I came from, who I was, how I got there, sacrifices and triumphs along the way, and my personal battles with mainly alcohol (and marijuana as a young man), and how I overcame those obstacles.

The sections that follow are painfully honest, pointing out many of my character defects as I matured, and what I ultimately did to recover from my addiction to alcohol.  Alcoholism is an insidious disease.  It tricks you to believe there is nothing wrong with you, that the problem is other people, and you are normal — not addicted to alcohol.  It makes you selfish, self-centered, and blind to its affects on those around you.  It also is tricky, often times walking you down the path of being a casual drinker, to more of a social moderate drinker, to a regular drinker under control, to a heavy drinker managing to keep your life in relative balance, to a full-blown alcoholic in the grip of addiction and lack of control.  You don’t generally wake up one day and say “geez, I am an alcoholic” and seek help, but rather you are taken to the edge of your life, where you are hanging on by a thread, desperate to make changes in your life to be restored to sanity.

This is a story of how I got there, and the path I took to reach my sobriety.  It is a story with a happy ending, although the path is winding and at times dark.  It is a story that should give the reader hope, and inspiration, especially if they are battling their own demons related to drugs or alcohol.  It is also a story that shows you can face many ups and downs, but until you admit to yourself your own failures and shortcomings, you run the risk of them controlling you, rather than you controlling them.  Take the time to read the synopsis of my life, and understand how my life’s experiences now shape the man and attorney I now am.  You will understand my deep desire to help others, in life, in the military, and in the courtroom better than you will of any other advocate you come across.  I am proud of my journey, although there are many things I would have done differently if I were not in the throws of my battle with alcoholism at the time.  This is how I became the person, man, advocate, military lawyer and recovering alcoholic I am today.

In an effort to ensure the privacy of those around me who many not want their part in my story shared so freely, I have changed the names of all the characters in my life with the exception of my parents, my wife, my siblings, and my children.  I have also not changed the names of those who are deceased.  But all other characters in the story of my life have pseudonyms, but they are free to share their insights and perspectives on their own terms, and on their own timeline.  I will do my best to keep them anonymous, although those who know me may deduce who these character’s real identity are — it is my desire to share the story without infringing on other’s desires to fly under the radar.  I hope you enjoy learning more about me, and how I became a recovering alcoholic, and fierce military defense lawyer.

Early Childhood Before School Years

My mother, Sue, made the decision to quit college and dedicate herself full-time to raising me. Meanwhile, my father continued his education for a while but eventually secured a full-time job at Mead Johnson, a baby formula manufacturing company in Evansville, Indiana, in early 1966, without completing his degree at Michigan State University. In 1969, he transitioned to a packaging draftsman position at Alcon Laboratories, an ophthalmological pharmaceutical and surgical instrument company in Fort Worth, Texas. When we moved to Fort Worth, we moved into a newly built apartment complex called “Highland Terrace Apartments” in 1969.  This complex was one mile from Alcon Laboratories, or about 5 minutes by car.  We lived there for several months before moving into a modest two bedroom house on Rickee Drive about 4 miles from dad’s work, or about 10 minutes by car.  In 1972, my father completed his degree at the University of Texas in Arlington. He continued working at Alcon Laboratories for thirty years until his retirement in 1998 at the age of 55, having held the position of Director of Packaging and Tooling.

Elementary and Middle/Jr. High School Years

My parents separated in early 1970 and were divorced on May 21, 1070.  I recall before they separated, that when dad got home from work there was always a lot of yelling and I recall my mother crying all the time.  When they separated, my brother and I moved back to the Highland Terrace apartments where we had lived when we first moved to Fort Worth.  I was in kindergarten at the time.  Moving and changing schools would become a way of life for me growing up: by the time I finished middle school, called Junior High School at the time, I moved 10 times, to three different cities, and attended nine different schools.

I Had No Childhood Friends

It was extremely difficult moving and frequently changing schools growing up.  In addition to never really making good friends in the neighborhood, or in my case the apartment complex, I never formed any friendships at school.  I was always the “new kid” who was usually ignored by most of the kids in the class.  I would make an occasional friend, usually those who were left out of the main groups or who were loners.  Even with the advent of social media, there is not a single person who I currently know from elementary school, and I cannot tell you anyone’s name with whom I attended elementary school.

Move to Pasadena, Texas, and Social Isolation

My mother met my soon-to-be stepfather, Ross Bancroft, in 1971 when I was in the first grade, and by the middle of the second grade, we moved from Fort Worth, Texas, to Pasadena, Texas.  We lived in Pasadena until the middle of the sixth grade, when we moved to Liberty, Texas.  Liberty was a much smaller town that Fort Worth and Pasadena, and the kids there were much more “clique-ish.”  The kids seemed to fall into the same type of socio-economic and racial categories as their parents: rich and upper middle-class kids hung out together, middle class stayed with other middle class kids, minorities where a group, and then there were the leftovers.  When I got to Liberty, there were six different sixth grade classes that did everything together – these classes were not random, but you were assigned to the classes based on your various test scores, grades, and achievements.  Since I was a good student with excellent grades and high marks on my test scores, I was assigned to “6-6,” the most advanced sixth grade class.  Not surprisingly, in the class were kids whose parents were doctors, engineers, lawyers, engineers, landowners, and other professionals.  Not surprisingly absent from the class were the minorities and poor kids.  Other than my academic achievements, I did not fit in to that class at all.

Parents had Inconsistent Employment

My stepfather, Ross, had bounced from job to job, driving a truck to refill vending machines, to working construction, to working on the petrochemical plants on the gulf coast.  By the time we moved to Liberty, he was an electrician’s apprentice working on becoming a journeyman, and he did not make much money.  My mom worked various jobs ranging from being a cashier at a convenience store to working in the produce department at a local grocery store.  Combined, they could hardly make ends meet, and sometimes they did not.

Grew up in Lower Class and Borderline Poverty

To say I grew up poor is not an understatement.  Living with mom and Ross gave new meaning to living “paycheck to paycheck.”  It was not uncommon for there to be no money at the end of the pay period for anything and I cannot count the number of times I heard arguments about “bounced” checks.  I am not sure if we were on government assistance, but we certainly would have qualified, and if not, it would have been by the thinnest of margins.  While we never went without food, I certainly was not pleased with many of the dinner offerings: spaghetti noodles, toast with gravy, sandwiches, canned chili and rice, hot dogs, etc.  There were no such thing as fresh vegetables, and I recall getting our meat from the “soon to expire” bin.  If it did not come in a can, we did not generally eat it, except potatoes.  I remember Ross going hunting, fishing, and crabbing, not for fun but to provide some food for us to eat.  I had one pair of shoes that had to last a full year, and even recall using duct tape to keep the sole on at one time.  Clothes were purchased the summer before school, usually at a discount department store that had “lay away” programs.  I never got new clothes outside of this summer shopping for the next school year.  I had one winter coat that had to last for a couple of winters.  While we did not get free clothes from any charity, I do recall getting “hand me downs” from older kids of my mother’s friends, and my brother Doug got everything I did not wear out.  The idea of getting something “name brand” was as foreign of a concept as time travel.  One of the biggest beatings I took as a child was when I fell and ripped a hole in the knee of my blue jeans.  You would have thought I had killed someone.  I wore those jeans for the rest of the year with a patch ironed on the knee. It was not an uncommon occurrence to have our electricity turned off, or our phone disconnected.  No matter the financial difficulty endured, there always seemed to be enough money for alcohol and cigarettes, and as I would find out in later life, marijuana.

Early Dreams to be a Lawyer

I knew I wanted to be a lawyer in 3rd grade.  As a kid before my parents divorced, I remember watching Perry Mason on TV and thinking that is what I wanted to do.  Perry Mason was always able to win his case, and I loved the fact he represented those who were facing trouble.  I can remember pretending to be Perry Mason in my bedroom in a makeshift court I assembled with my stuffed animals.  In third grade, we did an assignment where we wrote what we wanted to be, and I listed being a lawyer.  I wanted to be a lawyer to lift me out of the financial basement in which we lived, and I wanted the ability to protect myself.  I believed being a lawyer would do both.  From that day forward, I told anyone that would listen to me that I was going to be a lawyer when I grew up.

Bullied and Hazed in School

Given my family situation, I guess it was only a matter of time before the isolation as a new kid transformed into being picked on and bullied all the time.  Thank God there was not social media and cellphones back in the day, although I am certain we would not have been able to afford one.  The bullying started in earnest in sixth grade.  I recall that kids would wait for me to leave school so they would chase me and push me to the ground.  I was threatened so badly one day that I hid in the school after class, and I was found by a teacher – my mother was called to pick me up.  I remember getting yelled at for interrupting her day by forcing my mother to come pick me up at school instead of walking home.  When we moved to Liberty, the bullying became worse, with groups of kids waiting for me after school to beat me up.  I remember sneaking out of school and running all the way home to avoid getting beaten up by Junior High bullies.  Isolated, picked on, beaten up, and made fun of on a regular basis, I had very few friends and hated the walks to and from school.  I did, however, enjoy being at school because I was learning and not at home where things were difficult at best.

Physical and Emotional Abuse at Home with Mom and Stepfather

I spent most of my early years living in fear – fear of getting the crap beaten out of me by my parents, mostly my stepfather, Ross, and dad when I visited him in the summers.  What made it more difficult is that you could not predict what would set them off.  And what drove me crazy was that I would get in trouble for the same thing that my stepsiblings could do with immunity.  Whether it was not doing a chore, or not doing it right, or being at the wrong place at the wrong time, I would frequently find myself on the business end of a belt, vacuum cleaner cord, switch, or any other handy object.  I suppose such parenting tactics were okay in the 1970s, but today would generate home visits by CPS, removal of the children from the home, and charges of child assault in the military.  Both my stepfather, Ross, and my dad were clearly alcoholics – drinking all the time.  My mother also drank most nights, her favorite was rum and coke.  Ross was also a frequent user of marijuana, although I did not know it at the time.  Between the beatings, drug and alcohol use, and simple neglect, there was nothing for which to be at home and your presence simply put a target on your back.

Physical and Emotional Abuse by Dad

Things were not any better when I visited dad in the summers.  He would pack a cooler of beer and take it with him to work.  He would repack the cooler at lunch time, and again when we would go out for dinner.  In fact, I cannot remember a time we drove anywhere in the car that did not pack his six-pack cooler of beer.  In retrospect, this explains a lot of his behaviors, although at the time I was oblivious.  Dad, but more importantly his live-in girlfriend, Bailey Henshaw, would inspect the apartment when they got home from work – and I mean a real inspection.  Doug and I had to clean daily including picking up, doing the dishes, dusting the furniture, vacuuming the carpet, and raking the carpet.  Raking was using what looked like a garden rake made of plastic to get the shag carpet to stand up in an even pattern.  If we did not clean the house to perfection, there would be a long drawn out discussion, with us standing in the middle of the living room, while dad and Bailey sat down and berated us – at times I just wanted to get beaten so the noise would just stop.  This happened a good three times a week, with at least one of those occasions resulting in physical discipline – a belt, thrown shoes, slapped in the face – the method was always a surprise. So, whether it was in Pasadena, and later Liberty, or in Fort Worth, Doug and I always lived in a heightened sense of fear of being physically assaulted by our parents.

Tensions were Fostered between my Brother and Me by our Parents

My brother Doug and I are separated by a mere 20 months.  Close enough in age that we could be very good friends.  However, the way we were raised drove a wedge between us from an early age.  For both of our parents, and even our stepfather Ross, it seemed as if Doug was always getting the “short end of the stick.”  Doug was always in trouble, even for things that I would not get in trouble for – it was like the parents loved picking on him.  My mother told me when I was much younger that she got pregnant on purpose with Doug to save her marriage with our dad – and that she secretly stopped taking her birth control pills.  I think that this was the source of some of the animosity directed towards Doug by our father.  However, that does not explain mom’s or Ross’s attitude towards him.  Don’t think of it as I was treated great and he was not treated as good, think of it as I was treated bad, and he was treated worse.  In addition, our parents pitted Doug and me against each other.  It was as simple as if one of us got in trouble for something, we would both get punished.  This of course caused anger towards the other. Also, there were times when I was forced to punish Doug when he did something, and if I refused, I would be beaten too.  An example of this comes to mind when Doug was handwashing some dishes, and I was drying them.  Well dad’s live-in girlfriend Bailey did not think he was using hot enough water.  So, to remedy this, she turned the water on fully hot, and if he reduced it to cool it down, I was told to hit him – and if I refused, she would smack me.  What a situation!  But this type of pitting us against each other was commonplace.  Doug was a natural athlete and was very good at sports, much like our grandfather.  I on the other hand was average at athletics, while I was much more book smart and excelled in school – so it was normal for our parents to use the other’s strengths against each other – when talking about sports, it was “you’re not as good as Doug,” and when it came to school, it was “but you are not anything like Willie.” This intentional effort to pit us against each other kept us somewhat distant, and created the basis for our relationship as it developed later in life.  Distance did not allow us to get close, as after high school, Doug and I never really lived in the same place, and most of the time, in different countries.  Our current relationship, which I am working on regularly, has its genesis with the way we were “played” against each other as children.

School was my Saving Grace

In elementary and junior high school, I used school and schoolwork to shield myself from the harsh realities at home.  When I was at school or working on school projects, I was safe from mistreatment by my parents. I could get lost in studying and reading for school.  When I was not doing homework or classwork, I would be outside, because again if you were not around, you could not get yelled at or do something to cause the belt to swing.  This shield carried on into my later years and was the way that I made it through my childhood and early adolescence.

High School Years

I started high school in September 1979, and graduated in May 1983.  I attended three different high schools: Liberty High School in 1979; Hardin High School from late 1979 to 1981; and Burleson High School from 1981 to 1983.  I moved away from home to attend college in August 1983.

Difficult Making Friends at First – Liberty High School

Like in my elementary and junior high school years, I found it difficult to make friends always being the “new kid” in high school, especially when you are trying to break into a group of people who many have known each other their entire life.  Liberty High School was a continuation of Liberty Junior High School, where I was at the bottom of the popularity “food chain” and often bullied and hazed.  Nothing changed when I started attending high school – the same bullies were now attending high school.  There were approximately 150 students in 1979 in the freshmen class.  Because there were so many more students, many of whom were upperclassmen, it was easier to get lost in the background, and avoid being the center or ridicule or unwanted attention.  I played freshman football and participated in choir, although I was not particularly good at either.  As I did throughout my education, I enjoyed being in school and going to class – the learning process was always fascinating to me.  I really did not have an opportunity to develop at Liberty High School, as mom and Ross moved to Moss Hill, Texas within two months of the start of high school.

Moved to Moss Hill, Texas

Moss Hill is at the junction of State Highway 146 and Farm Road 105, fifty miles northwest of Beaumont, and fifty-eight miles northeast of Houston, in central Liberty County. For the last three censuses, it has had an official population of 49.  We lived in a three-bedroom, one bath farmhouse with no air conditioning or central heating.  There was a fireplace in the tiny living room and a propane gas heater in the dining room.  None of the bedrooms had heating or cooling.  The house was dilapidated, and in much need of various repairs.  We moved to this house because the rent was a mere $200 a month in 1980.  The house was about 4 miles from Moss Hill and about 6 miles from Hardin High School and was situated in the middle of nowhere, with fields and forest as far as one could see in all directions.

Hunting, Trapping, and Fishing

With absolutely nothing to do in rural East Texas and with no immediate neighbors or friends, I began to focus on trapping, hunting, and fishing.  There were unlimited places to trap and hunt and virtually unlimited game and fowl: racoons, rabbits, squirrels, coyotes, opossums, beavers, foxes, deer, boars, ducks, geese, doves, quail, and more.  When I was in 5th grade, I was in the Boy Scouts for about a year before it was too expensive, and I had to quit.  I really enjoyed scouting and developed a desire to learn how to live off the land, without the assistance of anyone.  I read all kinds of books about “mountain men” and survival in the wilderness.  When we moved to Moss Hill, I was able to start trying some of the things I had learned through my reading on trapping. Trapping was a way to make some money in the rural area of East Texas, with a racoon pelt averaging about $10 depending on the pelt and the fur trader.

The Mountain Man Fantasy

I had always fantasized about taking off to the mountains of Colorado to escape the misery of home.  It seemed like a perfect life to be left alone, living in the mountains, hunting, and gathering your food, and living in a small shelter.  I am not sure it was the perfect life, but in my young mind it was a way to escape the maltreatment at home, both physically and mentally.  So it was with great enthusiasm that I started running my trap line.  I would get up every morning at about 0400 to check the traps, and if I had game, time to prepare it before the day began.  I would have my stepsister, Tosha Bancroft, come with me on some days, but it was how I started most mornings.  I was no “Grizzly Adams,” but I was somewhat successful in trapping mostly raccoons and would make a couple hundred bucks or so in a month.

Mostly Small Game Hunting

We also went hunting regularly, usually for small game like squirrels and rabbits, but occasionally during the season, for deer.  It was normal for us to eat rabbits and squirrels, but when we went down to the “river bottom” for my stepfather Ross to hang out with his friends, nothing was off limits to the grill.  I thought some of the things they ate were disgusting so I stuck to the regular game of rabbits, squirrels, waterfowl, and deer mostly.  For the folks living in the “river bottom,” hunting season seemed to be a suggestion rather than a rule.

Deer Hunting

I remember one of the highlights of my life was when went deer hunting with Ross.  We had spent some time setting up our tree stands the few weeks prior to the hunting.  I recall it was cold out, and I had fallen asleep in my tree stand.  When I woke up, I looked around and directly behind me was a spiked deer.  I very slowly positioned my rifle around and slowly pulled the trigger.  I got him.  It was the first and last deer of my life.  Unfortunately, the first shot did not kill him, so I fired a second shot to finish the deed.  It was a few minutes later, and Ross walked up to the tree stand.  Ross said he knew I got one because there were two shots close together.  It was the first and only time he seemed genuinely proud of me.  We dressed the deer and hauled it back to camp.  Ross and mom were very excited that we had a pretty good supply of meat from the harvesting of the deer.  After killing the deer, my interests in hunting, fishing, and trapping started to wain but did not disappear totally.  At school, I was starting to get distracted with other activities that interfered with my outdoor activities.  That fall would be the last time I ever went hunting or ran traps in my life, although I still enjoy fishing but rarely can do it.

Introduction to Speech and Debate

At Hardin High School is where I met J. Harris Crabtree.  Mr. Crabtree was an English teacher and the Hardin High School Speech and Debate Coach when I attended from August 1979 to May 1981.  There were about 60 students in the freshman class in 1979.  I was an ambitious, smart, student who got good grades throughout school, but I was also an outsider who never fit in.  My self-confidence was fragile, and I never really accomplished anything other than getting good grades.  And while my grades were good, they were not that of a prodigy, but rather a hard-working kid making mostly As, with a couple of Bs.  Not extraordinary, but a solid good.  While my parents encouraged me to do well in school, in part because I could do well in school, they never really did anything to assist with making me better or competitive for elite higher education opportunities – I think the fact that I wanted to go to college was enough for them.  I met Mr. Crabtree through my history teacher, who could see that I was a good student, and recommended me for the debate team.  I had never debated before and knew nothing about debate or speech competitions.  Mr. Crabtree explained the concept of debate, how we would travel to tournaments, how it took a lot of time outside of class, and how it could open doors for me for college.  I was sold.  An activity that would keep me away from the house and even have me traveling on weekends was exactly what I was looking for to avoid the grief of being at home all the time.

Increased Focus on Debate

Mr. Crabtree entered us into competitions at various Houston and Beaumont area schools, and carefully managed what divisions in which we would compete.  Through his coaching and understanding of our talent levels, we competed and won several debates, advancing to the elimination rounds of many tournaments.  He gradually advanced us from novice standard debate to standard debate, to novice cross-examination debate to the highest category of cross-examination debate.  He did so while enabling us to experience the thrill of winning along the way.  I developed more and more self-confidence with every win, and with every tournament.  We wound up going to the state championship tournament as freshmen, and he encouraged me to attend a resident college debate workshop over the summer at Baylor University.

Difficulty with Money to Support Debate

The only drawback for debating was that it cost some money.  Not much, but even a few dollars mattered at my house.  When I started debating, you needed to wear a suit to participate.  I did not own a suit, and my parents could not or would not buy me one.  The superintendent’s son gave me one of his suits so I could participate.  I used the money I made from trapping to help pay for expenses associated with debate, and by the time the state tournament rolled around, I was able to convince my dad in Fort Worth to buy me another suit.  I was also able to convince him to spend the money for me to attend the Baylor University summer debate workshop, which also was enormous for my self-confidence.

Laser Focused on Debate my Sophomore Year

By the time my sophomore year rolled around, I was singularly focused on debate.  My hunting, trapping, and fishing days were virtually gone.  I worked on debate day and night.  I got a hardship driver’s license so that I could drive to and from the university libraries at Lamar University in Beaumont and the University of Houston to conduct debate research at the age of 15.  My dad helped me get a 1971 Volkswagen Bug, so I had a car to drive.  My sophomore year was dedicated to debate, and I did virtually nothing else.  I did the minimum necessary to make my As and Bs in class, and every other waking moment I spent either debating, practicing, or researching for debate.  It paid off, and I had a very successful year debating and my self-confidence was through the roof.  It no longer mattered that I did not have a large group of friends, and I became very close to the other debaters and speech competitors, many of whom I am friends with on social media today.  For the first time in my life, I had a crowd with whom I fit in and was liked.  Of course, there still was a group of people who thought I was dork and a nerd because I was one of those debaters, but they seemed to be silenced in my head.  Nobody waited to beat me up after school, and for the most part, I was allowed to flourish in my newfound activity.

J. Harris Crabtree – an OUTSTANDING Mentor

In addition to providing the foundation for my self-confidence, and encouraging me to succeed at every turn, Mr. Crabtree did his best to make sure we were not limited to the back roads of rural Texas.  Combined with our travel throughout the gulf coast to tournaments, Mr. Crabtree showed us other cultural and social activities to help grow our natural curiosity that is often stumped by living in rural areas.  When we traveled to Austin for the state tournament, he took us to more than just fast food restaurants.  I recall him taking me to my very first “fancy” restaurant – I believe it was called Mattie’s at Green Pastures.  It was a restaurant with an amazing courtyard and peacocks roaming the grounds.  It had a large porch and a great menu – I had never been to such a restaurant.  He also took some of us to Houston to see a musical starring, Robert Goulet.  It was my very first musical, or theatrical production of any sort.  I was memorized by the performance and was feeling like there was so much more to life than the limited views portrayed by my parents.  When we had to leave early for a tournament, he opened his home so we could stay on the floor and be ready to travel the next day without fear our parents could not get us to the pickup point that morning.  Mr. Crabtree transformed me from a frail, scared, loner into a self-confident, motivated, “I can accomplish anything” young man by the end of my sophomore year.  I now knew I was going to become a lawyer, not just dreaming about it.

The Decision to Move-in with My Dad

Again, the summer after my sophomore year, my dad had no issue paying for me to attend Baylor University debate camp again.  He had seen the success debate has played in my development, and he was fully supportive of it.  After the debate camp when I returned to my mother’s and Ross’s house, I was informed that they were going to move to New Mexico for a job for Ross.  I was crushed.  All my hard work seemed like it was going to vanish like a puff of smoke.  My mom recommended that I move in with my dad and continue to debate in the Fort Worth area.  I talked to my dad, who lived in the Joshua School District, and he made some inquiries and discovered that Joshua did not compete in debate.  He checked around and discovered that a school only a short drive from the house, Burleson High School, had an active debate program.  Burleson traveled frequently to tournaments and had won the state championship the year before.  One of my dad’s good friends lived in the Burleson district.  My dad suggested that we have my guardianship changed to his friend so that I could attend school in Burleson.  I made the decision to move in with my dad, and at the end of the summer my dad’s friend was appointed my legal guardian by a court.  I then enrolled in Burleson High School and promptly joined the debate team.

The Start of Junior Year at Burleson High School

When I started school at Burleson High School, I shed all the insecurities and self-doubts that I had carried throughout my elementary school, junior high school, and high school days.  I had been called “Willie” by my family, teachers, and students up to that point in my life.  I stopped going by “Willie” and insisted that I be called Will by my family – and introduced myself to everyone at Burleson as Will.  I would no longer be that scared kid hiding from those waiting to beat me up.  I recall during the first week at Burleson, I was confronted by another student, in part because I was new to the school.  Instead of backing down, and avoiding confrontation, I stood my ground – and offered to fight this kid.  There was some pushing and shoving, and despite being scared out of my wits, I did not show it – I became more and more aggressive until it was the other kid that backed down.  I had completely turned the corner on self-confidence and determination – there was no looking back.

Debate at Burleson my Junior Year

I met with the debate coach at Burleson, Mr. Blake Lyons, about what my role with the team would be.  He interviewed me about my background, tournaments I had attended, awards that I had received, what debate camp that I had attended over the summer, and what my goals were about debating at Burleson.  After much discussion, he made the decision to partner me with a senior whose partner had graduated the year prior.  She was the only senior on the team, and I am sure she was apprehensive about getting a new partner she did not know, from a school which she had never heard about.  There were about 375 students in their junior year attending Burleson.  As it turned out, Dillon Parcells was fantastic.  Not only was she a great debater, but she was a genuinely nice person – I had not run across many of such type people prior.  Dillon had a great work ethic, and there was virtually no drama in her life.  I was even more committed to debate than I was the year prior, and spent virtually every waking moment working on debate, at a university or law school library, or traveling to tournaments.  Dad was not elated with spending the money on debate, and I wound up getting a part-time job working at a full-service gas station in Fort Worth pumping gas.  Not surprisingly to me, we had a great season.  We won several local tournaments and made it to the elimination rounds of every tournament in which we competed.  At the nationally recognized St. Marks of Dallas Tournament, Dillon and I lost in the semi-finals on a split decision to the debater who would later win the college national tournament championship.  I also competed in individual speaking events, such as extemporaneous speaking, and usually made it to the final round, frequently placing in the top three.  Mr. Lyons was a driving force behind our success, giving us the latitude to debate our style of debate, and keeping us going to many tournaments a year.  At the year end debate banquet, I was recognized for being in the top three in every category that the school kept records for the year.  I was supremely confident, and that bled over to other aspects of my life.

My Social Life Improved Because of Debate

For the first time ever, I started dating.  I had the confidence to ask girls out on a date and was pleasantly surprised when they accepted.  This led to having girlfriends for the first time.  Not surprisingly, I dated girls on the speech, debate, or drama teams because I was constantly around them.  And, unlike my past experiences, I was fully accepted into this group of kids.  There were probably thirty or more members of the speech and debate team in all the grades.  By and large it was a great group of people to be around.  Not only did debating give me the confidence to feel comfortable around girls, but it also gave me the confidence to make new friends at different schools.  I now saw the same competitors from various schools most weekends at tournaments.  Over time I started to make good friends with them.  To this day, I remain social media friends with several debaters against whom I competed while debating at Burleson High School.  By this time, life at home was pretty good.  I mostly did my own thing while my dad lived his life.  We were past the point of physical abuse, and now he started treating me like an adult.  We slowly started to develop a relationship, albeit not a traditional father/son relationship.  He was still drinking heavily, and I never saw him when he did not have an open beer, glass of wine, or vodka orange juice working.  At this time in my life, I did not drink alcohol or use any drugs – you could call me a huge anti-drug advocate.  Dad gave me the curfew of sunrise and told me that if I would not make it home before then, I would have to call.  This very liberal curfew did me absolutely no good since all of my friends had much earlier curfews, and there is no fun just being out by yourself.  I truly was confident, independent, and able to virtually “come and go” as I pleased.

End of Summer Before Senior Year

The end of the summer before my senor year I spent traveling to visit my mother in Liberty, Texas.  I was beaming from my summer debates at Georgetown in Washington D.C. and a family trip to Canada for a fishing excursion.  At the end of the summer, I got John’s mother pregnant with John.  Of course, I did not know it at the time, but would find out later during my senior year.  We both wanted to keep my identity secret, as we legitimately feared disclosure would result in my physical harm from her father — as a result it was kept secret.  John was born at the end of my senior year, and I got to see him as an infant.  There were no plans to be a part of his life, and the most important thing to both his mother and me was to keep my identity secret, despite the hardship this caused on John and his mother.  For me, it was an exercise of boxing up negative emotions and events, and carefully storing them away not to be seen or heard of again.  For me, I went about my senior year as if nothing had happened.  It would be years before I would seriously think of John or his mother’s life again.

Debate at Burleson my Senior Year

Since Dillon graduated and went off to the University of Texas, my senor year I was partnered with the best debater and speaker on the squad, Brandon Shahan.  Brandon also happened to be the brother of my now long-term girlfriend, Summer Shahan.  The summer before we were partnered, I went to one of the best summer debate camps in the nation at Georgetown in Washington D.C.  By now, there were no signs of the old “Willie” around.  My commitment to working on debate continued, and it started to get under my dad’s skin a little.  The only real arguments we had revolved around why I was never home and always gone.  But these were not significant arguments.  We did get in to one heated argument that almost turned into a fist fight when he started calling my girlfriend Summer disparaging names.  My brother jumped in between us, keeping it from turning into a brawl.  At tournaments, Brandon and I were consistently winning local tournaments, and placing in the elimination rounds of all other tournaments we entered.  I continued to place in the finals of extemporaneous speaking and original oratory.  My network of friends from other schools continued to grow.  I was blossoming as a person, with all the self-confidence in the world.

Heartache and Real Emotions

That spring, I experienced heartache for the very first time – Summer broke up with me to see another guy.  I was her first boyfriend, and she wanted to experience dating other people.  I was devastated – crying – wailing – I was completely beside myself.  I had never let anyone get close enough to me to hurt me in the past as a means of self-protection that I had learned from the maltreatment at home by my parents.  Letting Summer into my heart was the greatest thing I could have done, but the short-term agony of a break-up was, at the time, crushing.  I guess the good side of this was that I could feel such emotions – that I could care for someone other than myself.  The bad side of the break-up is that it would be a very long time before I let someone else back into my heart.

Navigating Alcohol Use and Drugs in High School

Midway through my senior year, I turned 18.  The drinking age in Texas back in 1983 was 18.  Despite this new-found freedom to drink legally, I did not immediately turn to alcohol.  Part of me was deterred by my dad’s alcoholism, that he could not see.  Part of me just did not want to drink – I preferred having control over my emotions, feelings, and thoughts.  How this would change later in life.  While I would occasionally have a drink on a date with dinner, I never had more than one, and I was very responsible when it came to drinking.  Likewise, although some of my friends were experimenting with and using marijuana, I was so anti-drug that I would not even give it a try.  I recalled discovering how my mother and Ross were using marijuana, and I vowed I would never become like them.  In fact, the first person to every offer me marijuana (for real) was Ross Bancroft, my stepfather, when I was in ninth grade and we were fishing near our house in Moss Hill.

Distanced Myself from my Mother

Sometime during my senior year, Ross left my mother for another woman.  Mom was understandably upset, but I did not talk to her very much.  In fact, once I left Hardin High School because they were going to move to New Mexico, which never happened, I rarely talked to my mother.  It had to be a special occasion – birthday, Mother’s Day, Christmas – otherwise, I did my own thing.  With my growing self-confidence also grew my selfishness and self-centeredness.  Mom wound up moving to Springdale, Arkansas, to move to be near her mom and dad.  My brother Doug, who was living with my dad and me, followed mom to Arkansas, where he became an outstanding high school football punter, setting school and state records.  I continued to work at the full-service gas station until I decided on a college and left for school.

College Decisions and Debate

At the end of my senior year, I knew I was going to debate in college.  Debate had become my life and my identity.  My grades continued to be good – As and Bs, but I did not do particularly well on the SAT test, and my college options were limited to Texas schools for the most part.  My dreams of the Ivy League were dashed and thoughts of attending the national debate powerhouse college programs were out of my reach.  I received a partial debate scholarship offer to attend the University of Texas at Arlington (UTA) which had a good debate program, and to attend Houston Baptist University (HBU).  I decided to re-connect with a debater from Hardin High School, Dale Hampton, and attend HBU to debate together.  Knowing I intended to become a trial lawyer, I decided that I would major in communication to sharpen my courtroom skills.  In August 1993, I left home for college at HBU at the age of 18, and never returned.

Colleges and Universities

I attended three colleges and universities to complete my higher education.  Starting in August 1983 until August 1985, I attended Houston Baptist University (now Houston Christian University) in Houston, Texas, pursuing a communication degree.  From August 1985 until August 1988, I completed my Bachelor’s degree in communication and public address at North Texas State University (changed its name to the University of North Texas in August 1988). From August 1988 to May 1989, I pursued a Master’s of Science degree in contemporary rhetoric at the University of North Texas.  Finally, from August 1990 to May 1993, I completed my Juris Doctorate degree at South Texas College of Law (now South Texas College of Law Houston) in Houston, Texas.  Later in life, and as part of my U.S. Army education, I completed my Master’s of Laws (LLM) in military law with a criminal law emphasis at The Judge Advocate General’s Legal Center and School from August 2005 to May 2006 in Charlottesville, Virginia.

Houston Baptist University (now Houston Christian University) from August 1983 – August 1985

Arrival at HBU in August 1983

My arrival at HBU was filled with excitement, curiosity, and enthusiasm as I made the transition from living with my dad to living alone.  I was required to stay in the dormitories my first year at HBU.  The dorms were strictly segregated by gender, with there being a separate building for the males and females.  A dorm security guard manned the entrance to prevent folks of the opposite gender from entering the living quarters of the dorms.  This was a Baptist University after all, and dancing was still questionable in some quarters of the denomination.  There were four people in a dorm, each with their separate room and one shared common area.  I happened to share a dorm with three other freshman debaters at HBU.  While I was very excited to start the debate season and head out to our first tournament, I was interested in other activities in college, including joining various clubs, Greek life, and getting to know other students.  The freshmen had to arrive on campus a week before classes started to go through a very regimented orientation to prepare us for college life.  I was in the minority of students who attended HBU – as most of the students there lived at home and commuted to the campus.  While still extremely important, debate would have to take a back-seat as I started to get my feet wet living alone and experiencing life at HBU.

Non-Debate Activities at HBU

One of the first things that happened at HBU was that local fraternities started to recruit students to join their fraternity.  There were a couple of nationally chartered fraternities, a local fraternity, and a group of student organizations that were loosely formed and participated in activities with the fraternities.  I was eager to go through the fraternity “rush” process.  I was looking forward to the parties and the 2-3 weeks of courtship by different organizations.  Our part-time debate coach was a law student in his third year and an alumnus from HBU – he was also a member on one of the national fraternities and pushed all the debaters hard to join that fraternity.  I was not certain what to do.  My dad had been in a fraternity at Michigan State, although his fraternity was not on the campus of HBU.  Remember, the drinking age in Texas at the time was eighteen, so the national fraternities had huge alcohol fueled blow-outs, much to the chagrin of the strictly conservative Baptist leadership at the school.  The local fraternity was more conservative and most of the other groups had some connection to Christianity.  I ultimately was given “bids” to join three fraternities, and as predicted, joined the national fraternity of which our debate coach was a member like all the other debaters going through rush (there were 6-8 of us).

Social Life at HBU

In addition to the Greek life (or fraternity life), there was a small but active social scene at HBU on the weekends.  Groups of students would go to bars and dance clubs on the weekend, really letting it go – this was especially true for the dozen or so “heathens” that lived in the dorms and were not at HBU because of its religious affiliations.  This is the first time in my life that I really started to drink more than just occasionally.  I was drinking every weekend, and during various parties that may have occurred during the week.  I did not drink on most weekdays, and focused on my classes, and debate.  But for the first time, there was competition for time I had previously in high school had devoted to debate.

Dating While at HBU

Within a month, I started “dating” a woman named Rhonda Addison.  Rhonda was a very conservative Baptist and acted like one.  While we spent a lot of time hanging out, we certainly kept our distance physically.  This is when I noticed that I would rather be coupled with an average girlfriend than to be alone.  This would also become a theme in my life.  After a few months and dating a couple different women, I met Kirsten Jordan.  Kirsten was a member of a national sorority at HBU and participated in all the Greek life activities.  We hit it off immediately.  Kirsten had gone to a local high school within a few miles from HBU and lived at home with her parents.  Her dad was a local deacon with a Baptist church less than a mile from the campus.  It was not long before Kirsten and I were dating exclusively, and this continued for the entire duration of my time at HBU, culminating with our marriage on August 28, 1985, in the church where her father was a deacon.

Refocused on Debate in Spring 1984

After a couple of months of getting to know college life, joining a fraternity, getting into a weekend party routine, and settling down in classes, I started to refocus on the whole reason I attended HBU – to debate.  The team started meeting regularly to work on debate and discuss areas where we needed to research.  Since the library at HBU was limited, we often went to the University of Houston to conduct our research.  I recall that our debate season started inauspiciously, with mediocre performances at a few tournaments to start the year.  The difference in talent between high school debate and college debate was stark.  There were no “bottom feeding” teams that were just starting or only debated at a tournament or two all year.  In college, every debate team was there to win, and was traveling on the college debate circuit, whether it was local, regional, or national.  It took me some time to make the switch to college debate.  While we would usually make it to the elimination rounds of the smaller regional tournaments, it was difficult to make it to the elimination rounds of the national-level tournaments.  There was a very large difference between debating at HBU with its 3-4 teams that were on the traveling circuit as compared to Baylor or Kansas who had dozens of teams, all contributing to the research, writing, and development workload of the squad.  It was truly a “David v. Goliath” situation, and the outcome was usually predicted.  That first year of debate at HBU, I would characterize us as competitive with similarly situated schools – teams that had less than 10 fully active debaters – and we fared well when debating them.  Unlike in high school, there were many outside factors vying for my attention, including more difficult classes, and outside work.

Death of my Grandfather in 1984

In February 1984, my maternal grandfather Guy J. Andersen died.  This was the first death I had experienced in my family.  Although it was not long and drawn out, nor predicted, it was not completely unexpected that Grandpa Andersen died.  He got sick and took a turn for the worse, suddenly dying a month before turning 81 years old.  A lifelong employee at Pure Oil Company from where he retired, Grandpa Andersen was always healthy and walked daily – leaving my Grandmother Helen a sweet note on his napkin every day when he went for his walks.  I traveled to Springdale for the funeral out of respect for my Grandma Helen.  Helen and Guy were the bright spot for me growing up.  I recall the pure excitement I felt when I learned that they were coming to visit, or that we were taking a trip to Arkansas.  They treated us like grandkids, spoiling us at every turn.  I really did not know how to feel at the loss of my grandfather – I was sad, and grieved for the loss, but was not devastated.  I was concerned how missing time away from HBU would affect my classes, my fraternity activities, and my debate preparation – early signs of the abject selfishness and self-centeredness that was to manifest itself with my later alcoholism.  I remember sitting in the church next to my grandmother holding her hand as the ceremony was conducted.  I can only imagine the pain of losing your partner of well over 50 years although Helen did not show emotion that day.  I was glad that mom, Doug, and Angie were living in Springdale, Arkansas, to provide her with the support she needed during that very trying time.  Despite my best efforts, I could not get what I was missing back in Houston out of my mind during the nearly week-long trip.

Introduction to Marijuana

Shortly after my grandfather died, I was introduced to marijuana by a fraternity brother.  I had never smoked marijuana before, and I had been adamantly opposed to its use.  For some reason, it seemed okay to try now, besides it was being offered to me by someone I respected, and who by all accounts was successful with school.  The first time I tried it, nothing really happened.  It wasn’t until I tried it a couple more times that I felt the effects of the drug – and I liked it.  What started as an occasional use “here and there” eventually grew to using daily ten years later.  The good thing about when I was using marijuana is that I was not generally drinking.

Employment During College at HBU

My parents contributed no money to my college attendance.  If I wanted to attend college, I had to figure out a way to pay for it myself.  HBU was a private school, and although I was on a debate scholarship, it still did not equalize the cost as compared to state universities.  Since my parents were not paying for anything related to my college, I applied for financial aid, student loans, and got a part-time job.  I was approved for the grants and loans, but to make it from day-to-day, I needed a job.  I started working at a fast-food restaurant for a while and moved to cooking at a restaurant in a local shopping mall.  After about six months of working in food services, I found a job working as a telephone bill collector for a local medical group.  During my second year at HBU, I got a job as a “runner” for the law firm one of our debate coaches worked at, filing court documents as needed with the County Clerk.  I learned a lesson in humility during this period, noting that most of my friends in the fraternity were at HBU because their parents were paying for it, and they had money to spend without working.  I on the other hand was working for every penny I had – there were many events and activities that I could not participate in because I was working or did not have enough extra money to pay for the event.  Of course, I did not forget from where I came, but it was a real effort to work, keep up with college classes, prepare for and practice debate, travel to debate tournaments, and date Kirsten at the time.  Eventually I found my rhythm, and just had to accept that I was not going to be the best debater in college under those circumstances.  Despite feeling pulled in many directions, I still devoted substantial time and effort to debate, and enjoyed the activity even if my wins were not as commonplace as they were in high school.

1984 District III Qualifying Tournament

The debate year ended with a trip to the regional District III qualifying tournament.  The National Debate Tournament in college is very similar to the NCAA Men’s Basketball Tournament.  At the end of the year, every team in the nation has a chance to make it to the “dance.”  And for some, just making it to the NDT is a huge victory in and of itself – the NDT is a debate tournament for the top 78 teams in the nation out of the 1,000s of individual teams that competed throughout the year.  At the time I debated, a school could qualify up to two teams for the NDT.  The process was at the end of the year, the debate coaches throughout the country would rank the top 16 teams, and they would automatically qualify for the NDT and not have to debate their way into qualifying.  If you were not a “first round” team, you had to attend the regional district debate qualifying tournament and qualify by placing at the district tournament (46 teams qualify through the district tournament).  The remaining 16 slots were voted on by the coaches throughout the nation, and the top vote getters were awarded a “second round” invitation to the NDT.  HBU was in District III for the regional qualifier, with schools from Arkansas, Kansas, Louisiana, Missouri, New Mexico, Oklahoma, and Texas.  Our year ended with an average performance at the District III qualifying tournament but not nearly good enough to qualify for the NDT.  As far as qualifying for a “second round” invitation, we were not close to being good enough to be considered for a second-round bid – so I did not set the world on fire in my first year of college debate.  We finished with an overall winning record, but not by much.

Moved out of the Dormitories in the Summer 1984

The best thing about the end of the first year at HBU was the fact that I could move out of the dormitories.  I found a roommate and immediately moved into an apartment, seeking the freedom to have visitors in my apartment whenever I wanted and regardless of gender.  That last year at HBU from 1984-1985, I would move frequently – from the apartment to the University of Houston chapter of my fraternity’s house, to an extra room with the parents of a fraternity brother of mine.  I was constantly looking to save money, and each successive move was to a cheaper place than where I was living.  Ultimately, I moved in with Kirsten, but we had to keep that “top secret” as her parents, who were paying for the apartment, would not approve and insist that I not live there had they found out.  To effectively do this, I had a “cover” apartment – living with a couple other debaters from HBU – a place where I did spend a great deal of time.

Debating in the 1984-1985 Season at HBU

After our disappointing freshman year of debate, the top two teams at HBU decided to go to the University of Arizona college debate workshop.  Debate camps for college debaters were not very common, but since HBU had a very small squad, and only part-time coaches, we thought the assistance of a camp would prepare us for the upcoming year, especially given our mediocre performance the previous year.  The camp accomplished its mission: after three weeks in the desert, we returned to HBU motivated to start the year.  Things had become a routine by the start of my second year of college, and I was not as distracted from focusing on debate as I was the previous year.  The main difference now was that everyone on the squad now smoked marijuana, and when we got together to work on debate, it seemed to always be focused on getting high rather than focusing on working on debate.  It seemed like we were always working at about 50% efficiency.  There was no way we could be competitive at that rate, especially with our small squad.  The year’s results were not surprising – another mediocre year of debate and another year we did qualify for the National Debate Tournament.  Although we performed marginally better than we had the year before, I was incredibly disappointed in our results, and I did not see things getting any better in the future.  I started to believe that maybe this was the way it was going to be – mediocre effort resulting in mediocre results.  I still loved debate, and the thrill of tournaments is hard to explain, but if I wanted to get the results I had hoped for in college debate, drastic changes needed to happen.

Meeting other Debaters on the Circuit

Much like I had when I moved to Burleson, I made a lot of friends with debaters from other universities while debating at HBU.  I recall doing things with other debaters while we were at tournaments, and some of these debaters I formed a very close relationship with.  One was Kyle Garrison.  Kyle debated at Odessa College with his girlfriend.  Odessa College was a junior college and was similarly situated as HBU in terms of having the resources and assets to prepare during the year.  One of the things we did at HBU to try to level the playing field with the debate juggernauts was to trade evidence with some of the schools and programs that did not have unlimited resources – Kyle and Odessa College were one of the teams with whom we traded evidence.  As chance would have it, Kyle and I wound up debating against each other several times in our sophomore year and we wound up with an evenly split record against each other.  It was annoying that we wound up paired against each other because we worked together to plan for debating other schools like KU and Baylor, the big boys of District III.  Over the course of the year, we became friends with other debaters from other schools, like Marcus Caperton at the University of Texas, and Kevin Wolverton from Baylor.  Somewhere along the line, we all decided to transfer schools our junior year, and we all agreed to go to North Texas State University (enrollment of approximately 21,000 students), and a mid-level program with a good coach and great graduate assistant debate coaches.  I was going to debate with Kyle, and Marcus and Kevin were going to debate together.  Towards the end of the debate season, the plan was in place, and North Texas was expecting our transfers in the Fall of 1985, as they were losing their top team to graduation.

HBU, Religion, and Indoctrination 

Houston Baptist University’s name says it all – it is a small Baptist University with approximately 2,300 undergraduates enrolled in 1983.  Today it is Houston Christian University, and it has broadened its appeal to multiple denominations of the Christian faith.  Make no mistake about it, it is a university with a Christian mission.  This permeates all aspects of life on campus, from the mandatory convocations every week, to the professors it hires to teach classes, to the required Christian courses that are part of the curriculum (Old Testament, New Testament, Christian Doctrine).  For students that have not developed their faith, or who have a non-Christian faith, the emphasis on Christianity can be overwhelming.  For me, my faith and spirituality were still in their infancy, and certainly not well developed when I attended HBU, and I found the constant Christian theme a distraction from my learning.  There was a respite from the constant Christian drumbeat with my fraternity activities and with debate, both of which were very secular activities.  The focus was so religiously oriented at most activities and even in classes, that I would “turn off” and zone out many times during my education at HBU.  This was one of the main reasons that I was looking forward to my upcoming transfer to North Texas State University (later UNT).

Decision to Transfer to North Texas State University in Fall of 1985

There were many factors that informed my decision to transfer to North Texas State University.  First and foremost was the desire to debate with my friend Kyle Garrison.  We had become very good friends on the traveling circuit, and we thought we would make a great, competitive team and North Texas and qualify for the NDT with the possibility of debating in the elimination rounds of the national tournament.  We believed we would be competitive with the large national debate programs, and we would have a very successful year.  Additionally, I was not enjoying the atmosphere at HBU.  It was too small, too conservative, and too religious-oriented.  I believed that my academic creativity was being stifled by the environment at HBU.  Additionally, I wanted the academic choices that were afforded by a larger state university regarding the different and varied courses that were offered.  At HBU there was not much choice in the courses offered, and the areas of study were limited.  Finally, I wanted to experience the college environment of a large Liberal Arts university where there was diversity of opinions, ideas, and politics.  Overall, North Texas would broaden my higher education experience, and expose me to new ideas that were foreign at Houston Baptist University.   A couple of days after Kirsten and I married on August 28, 1985, we moved to Denton, Texas, and moved into an apartment we had previously found to rent.  We quickly moved in, and within a week were attending classes at North Texas State University.

University of North Texas (Undergraduate)

North Texas State University, now known as the University of North Texas (UNT), offered a vibrant educational experience during my time there from August 1985 to August 1988. The campus spanned approximately 963 acres (1.5 square miles) and boasted a diverse range of degree programs, colleges, and graduate offerings. At the time, NTSU had an enrollment of around 21,000 students, a number that has since grown to over 44,000, making it the fifth largest university in Texas, surpassed only by Texas A&M University, the University of Texas, the University of Houston, and the University of Texas – Arlington.

The Beginnings: Arrival at NTSU in August 1985

When my wife Kirsten and I arrived in Denton, Texas, as newlyweds in late August 1985, we were filled with excitement and anticipation. Leaving behind the restrictions imposed by Houston Baptist University and the constant presence of her parents, we viewed this new chapter as a liberation both academically and personally. Our apartment, located about three miles from campus, served as our home as we eagerly embraced the liberal arts education offered at NTSU. This was a refreshing departure from the limited academic environment of a college smaller than some of today’s largest high schools in Texas. With our move came the excitement of receiving a higher education from a large, diverse university, with open-minded professors who challenged the status quo, and who did not proselytize the Baptist message.  Pursuing my degree in communication and public address, focusing on the skills necessary for a future trial lawyer, I was particularly enthusiastic about engaging in debate and preparing for the upcoming season.

Debate Preparation: A New Mindset

The contrast between the debate programs at HBU and NTSU was striking, akin to night and day. While HBU had fewer than ten debaters, NTSU boasted a squad of over twenty members. Furthermore, four top debaters had recently joined our ranks, transferring from different universities at the start of the 1985 season. This influx of talent brought diverse preparation methods and valuable debate files from their previous institutions. Unlike HBU, where coaching was sporadic and predominantly handled by part-time law students or lawyers focused on their own careers, NTSU provided full-time dedicated coaches. Alongside the Director of Debate, Dr. John Gossett, three graduate teaching assistants were assigned to coach debate, significantly enhancing the support we received. Additionally, we engaged in numerous rigorous practice debates among squad members before participating in our first tournament of the year. The mindset at NTSU was distinctly different: for the top debaters and those striving to become one, debate took precedence over everything else—classes, relationships, part-time jobs, and other school activities. Although my fraternity had a chapter on campus, my commitment to debate prevented me from affiliating with them or engaging in their activities. Once the season commenced, working on debate became our daily priority, requiring several hours of dedicated effort. We would convene at the university or in debaters’ apartments, diligently “cutting cards,” researching, and developing arguments—a ritual we embraced without exception.  It was an expectation.

My Best Friend: Kyle D. Garrison

My friendship with Kyle Garrison, my debate partner, flourished as we immersed ourselves in this intense preparation and commitment. While we had known each other from the circuit prior to transferring to NTSU, spending several hours together every day naturally forged a strong friendship. Our shared values and perspectives on life, including political beliefs and a strong work ethic, further solidified our bond. Beyond our collaborative debate efforts, we also enjoyed social activities together. In the absence of my wife, Kirsten, who pursued her own academic goals, Kyle became my constant companion, and I spent more time with him than anyone else. Kyle maintained a long-distance relationship with his girlfriend from Odessa College, who attended a different university.  Kyle and I became roommates during tournaments, frequently traveling together to national-level events. Over the course of our academic and debate journey, we evolved into best friends, akin to brothers. We shared our life stories, fears, concerns, and current challenges, supporting each other through thick and thin. The depth of our friendship surpassed any other relationship I had experienced until then.

Game on: Travel and Debate on the Circuit in the 1985/1986 Season

After numerous practice rounds and weeks of preparation, we eagerly awaited our first tournament of the season. Marcus and Kevin were selected as the top team, the A-Team, from North Texas, while Kyle and I comprised the second team, the B-Team. The distinction between the teams primarily indicated the level of expectation for success in tournaments. Although I don’t recall the specifics of our initial tournament or our exact record, I do remember our exceptional performance and advancement to the elimination rounds in nearly all the tournaments we participated in. At local regional tournaments, we consistently reached the later elimination rounds, either emerging as champions or coming close. In national tournaments, we typically made it to the elimination rounds but fell short in the first or second elimination round. Despite not clinching the top positions in these tournaments, we accumulated an impressive list of victories over teams that eventually received a “first round” bid to the National Debate Tournament (NDT) or were ranked among the top 16 teams nationwide. After two years of mediocrity at HBU, the thrill of being part of a winning squad and consistently performing well was invigorating. This success motivated us to work even harder and dedicate more time to preparation for each subsequent tournament. However, the demands of debate consumed much of my time, leaving little room to grow as a husband or spend quality time with my wife Kirsten. It felt as though we were leading parallel lives within the same house, with infrequent intersections.

Marijuana: The Only Negative Aspect of Debating at North Texas

Overall, the first year of debating at NTSU was a tremendous success. However, there was one negative aspect that stood out: the prevalent use of marijuana among debaters. Almost all the debaters, including myself, smoked marijuana regularly, not just occasionally but daily, even during tournaments. Whether we traveled by car or plane, we always carried marijuana with us and smoked it consistently. I can only imagine how successful we would have been if we had not limited our abilities with the use of marijuana.  Personally, I refrained from bringing it into our home as Kirsten would not have approved. I tried my best to conceal my marijuana use from her, although I suspect she may have had her suspicions. Like my time at HBU, when I smoked marijuana, I avoided drinking alcohol. In fact, I rarely drank alcohol while attending NTSU.  Due to the constraints imposed by marriage, I limited my marijuana use to the periods when we were together as a debate squad, working on debate or traveling. If Kyle and I worked alone, we would refrain from smoking marijuana, except on rare occasions. If there was a day when we didn’t work on debate, I would abstain from smoking marijuana.

Background: The District III Tournament and the National Debate Tournament (NDT)

Typically held at the end of February, the timing of the District III Tournament allowed the NDT committee ample time to receive “second round” applications from teams that did not receive a “first round” bid or qualify for the NDT through the district qualifying tournament. The committee would then vote on the “second round” teams and notify them in early March. This timeframe also provided debaters with approximately a month to focus on preparations for the national tournament. The National Debate Tournament (NDT), where the national championship is awarded, took place at the end of March and the beginning of April, usually the last weekend in March. The release of the following year’s debate topic typically occurred in mid to late summer before the next debate season, with the first tournament held in mid-September. The period from early April to mid-August served as the “off-season” for college NDT debate, providing debaters with much-needed time off.

The Battleground: The 1986 District III Qualifying Tournament

Kyle and I eagerly anticipated the 1986 District III Tournament. Coming off an outstanding season of debate, where we secured victories or placed highly in multiple local tournaments and consistently reached the elimination rounds of most national tournaments, we were confident in our abilities. To enhance our competitive edge, we decided to write a new affirmative case for each round, preventing opposing teams from preparing for our affirmative cases in advance or engaging in last-minute preparations at the tournament after learning about a new case. The District Tournament comprised eight rounds, and after each round, the subsequent round involved power-matching, wherein teams with identical records debated each other. Although the exact details elude me, I believe the top two to four teams secured qualification for the NDT following the eight-round tournament. After a month of dedicated preparation, we were better equipped for the District Tournament than any other competition throughout the year. Our hard work paid off handsomely, as we emerged victorious in every debate at the tournament, securing 21 out of 24 ballots and ultimately winning the tournament, solidifying our invitation to the NDT.

The Dance: The 1986 National Debate Tournament

Due to our remarkable performance at the District Tournament, we entered the NDT as NTSU A, the top team from our university, despite competing as NSTU B throughout the season. Dartmouth College in New Hampshire served as the venue for the NDT. While we arrived well-prepared, the draw at the tournament proved to be formidable, to say the least. Out of the eight teams we debated, five advanced to the elimination rounds of the tournament. Consequently, our final record was a disappointing 3-5. However, our enthusiasm for the following year remained unshaken, fueled by the belief that based on our performance at the District Tournament, we stood a realistic chance of becoming one of the “first round” teams. The future of our debate career appeared bright.

The Need to Reset: Life at North Texas State University

Life at NTSU reflected the typical experience at a large university. Although known for its party reputation, NTSU provided a vibrant academic environment. The coursework proved more demanding than high school or HBU, and the campus buzzed with numerous activities and educational opportunities outside the classroom. During the debate off-season, I used the time to reconnect with my wife Kirsten and work additional hours to support myself financially as I was responsible for my own college expenses. I worked as a leasing agent for a local property management company. Kirsten, on the other hand, worked at a maternity clothing store in the local mall, foreshadowing our future family. As I focused on my work and spent time with my wife, my interactions with Kyle became less frequent compared to during the debate season. Instead of spending several hours a day together, we now met only a few times a week. My life settled into a routine, and things seemed normal as Kirsten pursued her degree while I pursued mine. When summer arrived, I made the decision not to enroll in any summer classes and instead worked full time to save money for the upcoming debate season, during which my time would be at a premium.

Catastrophe: The Summer Before Senior Year

At the start of the summer, Kyle sustained a knee injury while playing basketball with other debaters. Unfortunately, I was not present as I was occupied with my full-time job and spending more time at home. I recall Kyle expressing frustration about the lack of improvement in his knee, which led him to visit a doctor in mid-summer. The diagnosis he received sent shockwaves through the entire squad – he had been diagnosed with osteogenic sarcoma on his knee, a form of bone cancer. He faced a difficult decision between surgery to remove the cancer or amputation of his leg. I vividly remember the moment Kyle shared the news with me, and we both found ourselves in tears. After gathering our emotions, Kyle jokingly lifted his leg and said, “I sure hope I get to keep it.” Ultimately, due to the higher survival rate associated with amputation, he opted to have his leg amputated. In the days following the surgery, his girlfriend of several years decided to end their relationship, claiming she couldn’t provide the support he needed during this challenging time.

It became clear to me that Kyle’s surgery and subsequent chemotherapy would prevent his participation in the upcoming debate season. We would have to wait for a year before resuming our pursuit of the “first round” and the NDT elimination rounds. As the debate season approached, I was called into the Debate Director’s office, assuming it would be a discussion about what I should do during the year I would be sitting out while Kyle recovered. However, I was taken aback when I learned that the coach had made the decision for Kevin to sit out the season and debate with Kyle the following year. Instead, I was expected to continue debating in the upcoming year with an incoming freshman named Johnny Hover. I was speechless. Kyle was not only my partner but also my best friend. We had transferred to NTSU with the intention of debating together – it was part of the agreement. Dr. Gossett couldn’t simply make an executive decision and separate us as a team. To my dismay, Dr. Gossett informed me that he had made the decision for Kevin to debate with Kyle before Kyle’s cancer diagnosis, leaving me to debate with an incoming freshman. I was devastated. My dreams of advancing in the NDT and becoming one of the top teams in the country were shattered in an instant. I would be left training a young debater and delivering mediocre performances to conclude my debate career. The news hit me like a hammer, and I struggled to comprehend it. All the hard work and sacrifices I had made the previous year suddenly seemed futile.

The Twilight Zone: A Challenging Senior Year Debate Season of 1986/1987

I began my senior debate season with a sense of pessimism. Johnny Hover, a renowned high school debater from Oklahoma, was NTSU’s leading recruit. Despite Dr. Gossett’s confidence in him, I was disheartened, recalling the significant transition from high school to college debate when I debated at HBU. I was skeptical about Johnny’s potential to fill the void left by Kyle. Johnny’s non-conformist attitude was manifested in his punk attire, black painted nails, and spiked hair. He prioritized partying over debate preparations, making it difficult to work with him. His negligence towards preparation was a drain on our partnership, leading to a dearth of useful collaboration. Our support system was practically non-existent as neither Kevin nor Kyle was available to assist us with debate research and preparation. We participated in a few local tournaments with mixed results and fell short of reaching the late elimination rounds or securing any victories. Johnny’s unreliability culminated in him missing a tournament due to partying too hard, which left me without a partner and unable to compete. Livid, I decided to quit the team, telling Dr. Gossett I was done with debate.

After some reflection, I returned with the condition of not partnering with Johnny. Instead, I was paired with Jenks Ruffin a debater of average skills at best. The results were disastrous, resulting in an underwhelming performance in the debate season. We barely scraped through to the elimination rounds at local tournaments and maintained a “break-even” record at the limited national tournaments we attended. My relationship with Dr. Gossett deteriorated, leading to bitterness and disappointment. I was certain I would not return to the NDT. However, in a miraculous turn of events, Jenks and I qualified for the NDT at the District III Tournament. We did better at the NDT than was expected, managing a 4-4 record, thereby ending my college debate career. I felt an overwhelming urge to put this final, anticlimactic year behind me.  It was over.  The activity that had defined who I was as a person for the last eight years was finished – I would never debate another formal debate round in my life.  At the end of the year debate banquet, another debater who did not qualify for the NDT was recognized as debater of the year, and I took my senior recognition plaque and threw it in the trash as I left the banquet.  It was a long time before I spoke with Dr. Gossett again.

A New Chapter: Filling the Void

The end of debate in April 1987 left a significant void in my life. This time it was permanent – my eligibility was exhausted. Although the option of coaching and assisting the team the following year was available, I was still harboring resentment towards the program. During this period, my roommate, Kyle, was battling cancer with aggressive chemotherapy. Earlier in the year, Kyle moved in with Kirsten and me while he was undergoing chemotherapy.  His treatment was very aggressive, and they were giving him the maximum doses possible to rid his body of the cancer.  During his chemotherapy, he went into renal failure three times, and was hospitalized to stabilize that condition.  The chemotherapy was taking him to the brink of death to kill all the cancer in his body.  Kirsten was an absolute angel to allow Kyle to live with us as he fought cancer and struggled daily with his treatment.  It was difficult to watch Kyle wither away to a mere shell of the man he once was – and he did not have a hair on his body during this time.  About the same time as my debating career was over, Kyle decided to stop chemotherapy.  He believed he could not take another renal failure, and that the chemotherapy would kill him if he continued.  Once he stopped the chemotherapy, he slowly started to recover.  He started gaining weight and growing back his hair.  By the time summer of 1987 had rolled around, he was able to take care of himself, and was a glimmer of the old Kyle.  By the end of the summer, he moved out and was getting ready for the upcoming debate season with Kevin, a notion that still caused my blood to boil.

Welcome, Lauren:  November 25, 1987

The summer of 1987 brought an unexpected surprise: Kirsten was pregnant. As college students on the brink of graduating, we were caught off guard and had to start planning for an addition to our family.  I was in my final push to get my degree, with an anticipated graduation date of August 1988.  Kirsten anticipated graduating with her mathematics and education degree earlier but was planning on attending graduate school to study library information sciences.  We knew this would be both a time and additional financial burden, so we began to plan for it as best two college kids could.  By the time Lauren would be born in November 1987, both Kirsten and I would be 22 years old, soon to be 23.  I continued to work at the property management company, seeking as many hours as possible to prepare for Lauren’s birth.

By this time, Kyle and Kevin were busy with the new debate season, preparing and traveling to various tournaments.  Frankly, I did not follow their tournament schedule or results at all.  Only if Kyle mentioned it to me would I know anything about their results, or anyone else on the debate squad for that matter.  The way my debate career ended soured me on the entire NTSU debate program, and Dr. Gossett in particular.  Once the Fall 1987 semester began, it was back to normal for Kirsten and me.  We were attending classes and readying ourselves for the addition of Lauren to our family.

When it was time to deliver, Kirsten’s parents were there, and my dad drove up from Fort Worth.  It was an amazing experience, although I was not permitted into the delivery room since it was a planned C-section.  Within a day, Lauren was at home in the nursery we had prepared, and we were adjusting to being new parents.  Not able to afford a nanny, we offered a debater at NTSU to live with us in exchange for watching Lauren when neither Kirsten nor I could be there.  Corey Joplin was a great kid and did a wonderful job with Lauren – this arrangement gave us the flexibility to continue with our classes, and not “skip a beat” as we pursued our academic goals.  Admittedly, the addition of Lauren to the family caused additional stress between Kirsten and me.  Between the ordinary duties of the parent to newborn, we were continuing with being full time college students.  Also, most of the responsibilities for caring for Lauren were borne by Kirsten, with me working most of the time when I was not in class.  Still, over the course of the time since I stopped debating, Kirsten and I did not seem to grow together as a couple, but seemed to continue our parallel lives, only now with a child.

Reflections on Fatherhood: Breaking Free from Shadows of the Past

From the moment of Lauren’s birth and her transition from infancy to toddlerhood, I found myself lost in introspection about my role as a father. The shadows of my own tumultuous upbringing, marred by the harsh parenting styles of my parents and stepfather Ross, hung heavily on my mind. With the close of my debating career and a conscious distancing from many of the debaters, I had virtually eliminated my marijuana use—an indulgence that Kirsten would have deemed as unacceptable. Alcohol, too, had no place in my current life.

Yet, despite my attempts to steer clear of these external influences, the nagging fear of perpetuating the cycle of abuse I had endured as a child persisted. I was determined to defeat this evil legacy. Although Lauren was still too young for this concern to manifest fully, the relentless worry that I might fail as a father and might not have the necessary skills to raise Lauren in a warm, loving environment gnawed at me.

Our domestic life was punctuated with frequent disputes. In one incident, Kirsten hurled a can of beans at me during a heated argument, striking me on the back. Overcome by rage, I pinned her against the wall, a hand at her neck, only to snap back to reality a few seconds later, mortified at my own actions. This terrifying incident shook me to my core and left me wondering about the boundaries that could be crossed, especially if the violence was initiated against me. Consequently, my mind wrestled relentlessly with my roles as a father and husband, and the question of whether I was equipped to perform them effectively. This self-doubt consumed me, leaving me in a perpetual state of unresolved introspection and self-questioning.

Leap of Faith: The Choice to Run for Student Government President

As I commenced my final semester in late January 1988 to complete my undergraduate degree, I faced the prospect of fulfilling my foreign language and science requirements, and one last advanced communication course. The decision to take intensive French, encompassing four semesters worth of coursework crammed into a single semester, was made. My chemistry courses were deferred to the summer of 1988, setting my graduation for August that year.

In the spring semester of 1988, I began taking my last communication class, COMM 4650, or Management of Persuasion Communication Systems, as it was listed in the 1988-1989 University of North Texas Course Catalogue. The course description listed it as a three-hour course that examined the “design, organization and administration of persuasion campaigns,” and developed “professional skills to change attitudinal goals and influence behavior.” This class, colloquially known as “Campaigns and Campaigning,” delved into the intricacies of elected officials’ campaigns, advertising strategies, and public relations drives.

In late February 1988, a campus newspaper article about the annual Student Government Association elections for president and vice president in early April 1988 caught my eye. A gaping void had existed in my life since the end of my debate career in April 1987. I surmised that the presidency of the student government would offer an enriching experience, and moreover, it would enable me to apply the principles I was learning in my campaigning class to a real-life campaign. With the prospect of staying at UNT for an additional year for graduate school in communication, running for president seemed increasingly plausible. Kirsten would still be working on her master’s degree, and I could lead the student government while pursuing my graduate studies. The lure of the student government presidency grew stronger when I discovered that it was a paid job that offered a monthly salary of $2,000, equivalent to $4,905.27 in 2023 dollars—surpassing what I was earning at the property management company.

The decision was made. I would run for the student government presidency at the University of North Texas. The challenge was finding a running mate, as elections were held for tickets of president and vice president. The candidate pool within my circle was limited to debaters, which I felt would hamper my chances. Since I was a complete outsider with no experience in student government, I needed a running mate who was either already involved in student government or active in campus organizations. A fraternity member seemed to fit the bill perfectly. So, I reached out to the president of the NTSU chapter of my fraternity and proposed the idea of finding a running mate from the fraternity. Following his recommendation, I spoke to Jason Rutherford, a dynamic junior with an active campus presence. After a lengthy discussion about the potential benefits and drawbacks of running and sharing my vision for our campaign, Jason agreed to run alongside me as my vice-presidential candidate. The next day, we filed our paperwork to run in the upcoming student government presidential election—a bold move considering our lack of prior involvement in student government.

The Battle for the Ballot: An Underdog Election Campaign

Faced with the formidable challenge of running as underdogs, our election strategy was to “divide and conquer.” Instead of canvassing together, we opted to crisscross the campus individually, campaigning for each other. Our competition was steep: three other tickets, all seasoned in student government since their freshman years. The most formidable among them were John Theobald, a vice president of a rival fraternity, and Shannon Broadmoor, a female student senator. The task of toppling incumbent student government and fraternity leaders was formidable, especially for two political newcomers like us.  Our path to victory could only be paved by a meticulously planned and flawlessly executed election campaign. I drew upon the knowledge and concepts from my campaigning class to design a comprehensive strategy. Our days were consumed by exhaustive efforts—meeting with student organizations, delivering speeches, engaging with students, participating in debates, and mobilizing the debate squad.

Meanwhile, Jason spearheaded efforts to rally the fraternity and their sister sorority behind our candidacy. Given John Theobald’s active role in his fraternity, we anticipated a tight race for the Greek vote, assuming Jason succeeded in garnering support. Our campaign arsenal included screened t-shirts, customized buttons, and printed literature.  My contributions to the campus newspaper included op-ed pieces, while I also rallied former debaters to write endorsement letters to the editor. The energy I poured into this campaign mirrored the zeal I brought to preparing for the 1986 District III tournament with Kyle.

On election day, Jason and I logged ten grueling hours outside the student union building, distributing campaign literature and urging students to vote for us. When the day ended and the ballots were counted, Theobald and Broadmoor led with 38% of the votes, followed closely by us with 35%. The remaining two candidate tickets split the remaining 27% of the vote. Although not a win, our efforts had earned us enough votes to propel us into a runoff election, slated for the following week.

The Battle in the Runoff: A Blitz of Determination

Emerging from the general election, Jason and I savored the sweet taste of achievement, having run an unexpectedly formidable campaign. However, we were acutely aware of the potential pitfall that lay ahead. Our rivals, Theobald and Broadmoor, steeped in the traditions and familiarity of student government, held a formidable appeal for the 27% of voters who had supported other candidates. Their extensive involvement in student government circles rendered them more recognizable, which we feared might sway undecided voters. With a mere week left to the runoff, we revved our campaign engine into overdrive, focusing on mobilizing the traditionally apathetic voting section of our student body.

Our campaign received a boost when Kyle returned from his trip to the NDT, sidestepping my disappointment that he was paired with Kevin in the final year of debate, to lend us his tireless support. We leveraged this energy, diving into a flurry of campaign activities, another one-on-one debate, and numerous impassioned speeches to student organizations. We made a strategic decision to target the graduate students, whose votes, at the time, were valid in the election. This decision came from recognizing their potential as an untapped voting bloc, although this rule has since changed to only allow undergraduate students to vote in student government elections because the graduate students are now represented by a graduate student council.

The runoff election day saw the three of us, Kyle, Jason, and I, tirelessly campaigning outside the student union. Our fervor did not wane, even as the final minutes ticked down. We sprinted into the polling station just as the two-minute warning was announced, casting our votes just as the doors closed. Little did we know that our efforts would result in a razor-thin victory margin. After a nerve-wracking wait and three recounts, Jason and I were declared the winners by just two votes. It seemed our last-ditch effort had indeed tipped the scales. Kyle, Jason, and I swung the election with our final three votes!

A New Era: Power Transfer and Consolidation

In the wake of the election, I assumed my role as the president of the student government. My first order of business was the critical task of filling the executive positions within the government. Kyle Garrison, my steadfast ally and best friend, was appointed the director of External Affairs, a pivotal role with immense influence over our relationships with off-campus entities, including local and state politicians.

The seismic shock of our victory resonated within the student government, with many members finding it hard to believe. In an effort to foster unity and mend any residual divisions, I extended an olive branch to the Theobald and Broadmoor ticket, and their supporters, by appointing many of them to various positions within my staff. With these appointments, we built a diverse, balanced administration that represented varied perspectives and experiences within our student body.  The only outsider I appointed to the executive staff was Kyle.

The Balance of Power: Student Service Fee Committee

The most empowering facet of being president of the UNT student government was the opportunity to chair and appoint the student members of the Student Service Fee Committee. This committee, comprised of four faculty members and five students, held the critical responsibility of allocating student service fees to various campus organizations.  Every semester, students contribute service fees alongside their tuition, forming a fund to be dispersed among campus organizations through the committee. The assortment of beneficiaries ranged widely, from the university football team, bands, choir, cheerleaders, clubs, and crucially, the UNT debate team. The latter, in fact, relied entirely on these service fees to cover its budget, including coaches, travel, tournament fees, and operating expenses.

Given my recent experiences with the debate team, it was tempting to contemplate a committee appointment that might deprive the debate program of its funding. The wounds from my senior year, forced to debate without Kyle, were still raw. However, I felt it essential to confront this issue directly, so I requested a meeting with Dr. Gossett, who agreed without hesitation.  In our conversation, I voiced my deep disappointment with his decision, explaining how it had unfairly disrupted my plans to debate alongside Kyle and ultimately hampered my final year’s national competitive standing. I detailed how his decision had failed to consider our friendship and its impact on my life.

Dr. Gossett was receptive and apologetic. It was during this conversation that I suggested that if he ever intended to significantly elevate the UNT debate program, the time was ripe. I advised him to seek triple the previous year’s budget, thus facilitating a more extensive program and enabling more students to participate in national level competitions. I further proposed the addition of a full-time research assistant to help UNT compete with debate powerhouses like Kansas and Baylor.  While I couldn’t guarantee approval, I assured him that if he ever envisioned making bold strides to expand the UNT debate program, this was the ideal opportunity. I left the meeting with a sense of empowerment and closure, feeling as if I’d had the final say in the matter concerning my senior year debate experiences.

Subsequently, I appointed Kyle, Jason, Shannon Broadmoor (now Kyle’s girlfriend), and another student to the Student Service Fee Committee. Dr. Gossett seized the opportunity, submitting an ambitious budget proposal inclusive of funding for a full-time research assistant. In a turn of events, the committee approved it.  That was the last time I spoke of my final year debate experience. My sights were now set on leading the student government and exerting a university-wide influence on enhancing student power and shaping university policy.

Bittersweet Victory: Graduation and the Future

The elation of winning the election and taking the helm of student government was tempered by the impending realities of graduation in August 1988 and preparing for graduate school that fall. I submitted my application and was soon accepted into the program. I had to confront my neglected academics, with my final semester grades reflecting my campaign-centered focus. Despite a successful real-world campaign project in my “Campaigns and Campaigning” class, my lack of attendance resulted in a B, my only B in a communication class at UNT.

In August 1988, I graduated with my Bachelor of Arts, honored with the Academic Achievement Award in Communication for the highest GPA and the Service Award in Communication for my work on the campaign and an AIDS awareness initiative. As I prepared for graduate school, life offered new challenges, with my relationship with Kimberly hanging by a thread. Despite the obstacles, I was ready to navigate these turbulent waters, holding on to the lessons from the campaign trail, and begin the new academic year.

University of North Texas (Graduate School August 1988 – May 1989)

The Start of Graduate School at UNT

The time between graduation in August of 1988 and the start of graduate school classes was an extremely busy time for me at UNT.  My duties as president of the student government were overwhelming as I prepared for the new academic year.  There were many things to accomplish before the new class arrived, and the role of student government was huge – we were responsible for assisting with transitioning the incoming freshmen from high school to college and were developing a program for interested students just arriving at UNT.  We had official roles in all official University functions – if the University was presenting something, a representative from the student government was always present. Also, I was in the process of developing a plan on how to expand the traditional role of student government into an active, external reaching, student advocacy platform for student-minded government reform. I had no idea of the wide reach that student government had in the functioning of a university.

Unavoidable Domestic Turmoil at Home

Meanwhile, at home things between Kirsten and me were close to unmanageable.  We were fighting and arguing all the time, over everything.  I was terrified at the prospect of failing as a father – this fear consumed me, and it was paralyzing.  The only way to shake the feeling was to not be around, simple avoidance.  I was terrified that I could not break the cycle of violence perpetuated by my parents and stepfather.  Intellectually, I knew what I had to do, but I was still shaken to my core at my physical reaction to when Kirsten threw the can of beans at me.  How on Earth could I have reacted in such a way? What lurked just below the surface that could be unleashed when I least expect it? What if I had not caught myself when I reacted with violence? I was questioning who I was at my core, not the person who I had carefully crafted after years of debate and developing my self-confidence.  I started to question whether I was just like my dad and stepfather, just a powder keg ready to explode at the slightest provocation.  I was deeply afraid and did not know how to deal with these self-doubts and fears.  I knew I was capable of emotional detachment having walked away from John years prior without much of a second thought. Was this the time to detach, and protect both Kirsten and Lauren from my true self? What if I was able to temporarily control it, only to have my anger and venom expose itself later down the road when Lauren was old enough to understand it? Wouldn’t be better for Lauren not to grow up in an environment where her parents constantly fought, and her dad had to constantly monitor his behavior?  It was too much to process clearly, and I had other responsibilities to attend to, including graduate school, being a teaching assistant, and my duties as president of the student government.  Utilizing my coping skills developed during my childhood, I boxed up the feelings, and put them on a self in my mind, hopefully to avoid them at all costs.

Student Leader Retreat Before Fall Classes

Before fall classes began, there was a student leader retreat where all the student leaders attended a workshop on leadership skills, and various teambuilding exercises.  Jason and I attended, as did other student leaders from many organizations across campus.  I recall it happening over a weekend and involving at least one night away from home.  It might have been more; I just don’t recall.  I remember there were activities and classes during the day, and we were somewhat free at night.  Also on this retreat was Daisy Lewis.  Daisy was involved with the organization that brought outside programing to the university, like plays, musicals, shows, movies, exhibitions, and other items of interest.  I had known Daisy from my days at Burleson High School.  She was a member of a forensics team at her high school where she competed in acting events like one act play, humorous interpretation, prose, and poetry.  While we did not know each other well but we certainly were aware of one another from high school.  During the time at the retreat, Daisy and I spent a lot of time together, talking about our roles with our student organizations, what we had been doing since high school, and what we were excited about for the upcoming year.  At some point during the retreat, we started talking about our personal lives – and I opened up about my problems at home, and my fears about fatherhood.  Things progressed from there and seemed to connect.  I was very attracted to her and wondered why that happened.  I spent considerable time mulling it over in my head, and when we returned from the retreat, she was on my mind.  As I processed it, I concluded that I was miserable in my marriage, that I had not grown together with Kirsten during our marriage and that we were on our own separate paths, that I was terrified that I could not control my anger toward Kirsten, and that I was frightened to the core that I would be a bad father raising Lauren in a maladaptive environment.  It was after this encounter with Daisy, and my deep contemplation before and afterward regarding my abilities as a husband and father, that I decided to tell Kirsten I wanted a divorce. In my mind, it was better to do this now, when Lauren was too young to remember Kirsten and me in a horrible relationship and give her the opportunity to develop healthy relationships with us separately.

Divorce from Kirsten and Moving Our Separate Ways

It was within a week of making the decision in my mind that I told Kirsten that I wanted a divorce.  I don’t recall any big scene or angry outburst, as it almost seemed like she knew it was coming.  I think that Kirsten moved to Fort Worth, where her parents had recently moved, and moved in with them temporarily.  I was left with the task of moving out of our residence and finding a new affordable place to live.  It was not long before I found a duplex in a house on Mulberry Street, right adjacent to campus.  It was directly across the street from the Fine Arts Building and as close to campus as one could get without living on campus. The transition to living alone seemed easy enough.  Within a couple of weeks, Kyle had moved in with me at the Mulberry duplex.  With graduate classes about to start, my teaching responsibilities kicking off, and my duties as president of the student government, I did not have much time to think about what had just happened between Kirsten and me. As I had done so many times in the past, I packaged my emotions and put them on a shelf.  Kirsten was quick to file for divorce in Denton County, and before Christmas, we were divorced, with the court entering the final decree on December 9, 1988.

Duties as Teaching Assistant

As a teaching assistant (TA) for the Department of Communication at UNT I was responsible for teaching two sections of the introduction to communication class that was required of all students.  This included attending the general lecture by the class professor and preparing for the class I taught to my sections. In addition to the approximately 25 hours a week I was spending working the president of student government, I was expected to work up to 20 hours a week as a teaching assistant.  This was in addition to attending graduate class and preparing for those classes daily.  To say I was busy was an understatement.  In addition to receiving a monthly stipend for teaching, TAs received tuition waivers for a portion of their graduate school tuition.  It was common knowledge at the time that TAs were often favored candidates for subsequent PhD programs and other advanced educational opportunities.  For me, being a TA went hand-in-hand with my job as the president of student government.  Being a TA allowed me to have close interaction with undergraduate students on a regular basis, and the ability to directly assess the needs and desires of the students in their educational experience at UNT.

Graduate Communication Studies at UNT

During this time, I was a full-time graduate student taking nine hours of advance communication classes (three courses).  I was enrolled in the Introduction to Graduate Communications Studies course, Communication Research Methods (social science statistics), and Organizational Communication.  In addition to the in-class time commitment, these graduate level courses required significant out-of-class preparation and the completion of various assignments.  Combined with my TA responsibilities and duties as president of student government, I was on campus by 0800 everyday, and was never at home before 1800 when I would prepare for the next days classes.  I could not imagine being more involved in university life than being a student, teacher, and student representative.  Despite the demand on my time, I was having the time of my life being so active in the university life.  It seemed like I had found how to replace debate, and I was enjoying every minute of it.

Daily Operations of Student Government

On a regular day, I would arrive in the student government office at about 0800 and stay there most of the day.  I would do my office hours for my TA position by appointment, and if anyone wanted to meet with me, I would usually meet them in the student government office (it was much nicer) rather than my TA cubical.  The executive staff would normally come and go starting at about 0900.  We were there to manage any day-to-day questions of the Dean of Students, or other administrators.  My daily tasks included working on the agenda for the weekly meeting with the representatives and student senators for our general sessions.  I also worked on any special projects that we were pursuing at the time.  For my administration, we were committed to community outreach, pushing the student message to different forums: the local community, local and regional governments, national student government organizations, and state governments.  This was in addition to the responsibilities of providing a voice to the university administration, faculty, and staff.  In addition to these daily responsibilities of governance, we endeavored to accomplish several projects to improve student life at UNT.

Special Projects of UNT Student Government

Without going into detail, there were several projects and initiatives for which we advocated or created.  This including establishing a “Freshman Intern” program where we could get freshmen involved in student government from a very early stage – thereby giving them a foundation to become a productive member of student government in a variety of positions as they matriculated through the university.  Additionally, we established the Raupe Scholarship where we created a fund to help offset the costs of attendance to professional and educational conference for students who were looking to expand their specialized skills and knowledge.  We instituted lobbying efforts in Austin where we would take students and meet with their state representatives and senators to advance and support proactive student legislation.  We made monthly trips to Austin for these lobbying efforts.  We organized and created the Texas political forums where we would invite candidates for public office to come speak to groups of students.  Participating in these forums were the candidates for the Supreme Court of Texas and other statewide office seekers.  We sought to have a student appointed to the Board of Regents as an advisor to the board that controlled the strategic direction of the university.  Finally, we looked to establish regular meetings with the President and Chancellor of the university.  Chancellor Hurley was open to the idea, and regularly met with the student leadership to keep informed of student issues.  We did everything we could to empower students and make their higher education at UNT a memorable and rewarding experience.  I continued as president of student government until mid-April 1989.

Dating and Social Life in Graduate School

After asking for a divorce and Kirsten moving out in August 1988, I continued my life as an individual who was going through a divorce.  I did not really date much immediately following Kirsten moving out, as I did not have much time for social activities adjusting to graduate school, teaching responsibilities, and my duties as president of the student government.  In fact, I spent all my time, including the weekends, working on these three objectives.  I was surprised at the difficulty of classes compared to the classes I took as an undergraduate, and the expected outside preparation required for each class.  I was attending graduate school full-time, and unless you were part of my studies or student government, I had no interaction with people.  I did participate in social activities that were related to these activities: groups of TAs would meet for lunch or dinner, members of student government would meet for lunch, or there would be an organized social event hosted by either the Department of Communication or the student government which I would attend.  It took me a couple of months to get into a routine before I was comfortable enough to begin enjoying some off time during the evenings and weekends.

I had been spending a lot of time with one of the former supporters of Theobald and Broadmoor that I had appointed to assist with executive staff of my administration: Janet Dodd.  Janet had worked hard trying to get Theobald and Broadmoor elected, and at first seemed reluctant to assist my administration with running student government.  This reluctance seemed to dissipate when Shannon Broadmoor agreed to be part of our administration and started dating my best friend, Kyle.  Over the course of the beginning of our administration, Janet worked to incorporate our ideas into the daily functions of student government.  She was smart, enthusiastic, and energetic.  I also saw Janet everyday for several hours a day.  I am not sure of the exact date, but one day I asked her to join me for dinner.  She agreed and we had a great time – it was the first time we really interacted with each other outside of student government, and the first time we talked about things completely unrelated to our jobs.  I found her to be funny, engaging, and interesting.  She was a few years younger than me, and in her junior year at UNT.  After that dinner, it was not uncommon that we would go to lunch together during the day and would go out in the evenings and on the weekends – its not that we officially started dating each other, it just wound up what we were doing.  By the time my divorce was final in December 1988, we had made plans to get an apartment and move in together starting in January 1989.

While it did not dawn on me at the time, or at anytime in my youth, in retrospect I think I had a need to be always in a relationship.  After I started dating Summer during my junior year of high school, I don’t recall a time when I was truly single.  I was either dating someone exclusively, married, or working on dating someone.  I think this need to be in a relationship was my way of dealing with feelings of inadequacy that had haunted me since my early childhood.  If I was in a relationship with someone, then I was wanted and desired, and my feelings of inadequacy were negated.  I think I had a need to be “loved” by someone to make up for the lack of love I experienced as a child growing up from my parents.  This would become a serious character defect of mine that would follow me for decades – but explains how and why I would move from relationship to relationship with little or no gaps in between.

Increased Use of Alcohol and Drugs

When Kirsten left, I was on my own without any adult supervision.  As a result, I returned to using marijuana, but not daily and certainly not during the day when I was working, teaching, and attending class.  Over time, the frequency increased, and I reached the point where most days after finishing with my daily activities, I would smoke marijuana to unwind from the day.  I was still not a big drinker during this time but would consider myself a regular pot user.  After moving in with Janet, there would be times when we experimented with other mind-altering drugs such as MDMA, methamphetamine, psilocybin, and LSD.  These occasions were rare, and always on the weekends.  I found that the use of marijuana allowed me to not dwell on the fact that I was not seeing Lauren on a regular occasion, and that I was certainly not amounting to the father I had hoped to be in my dreams.  Towards the end of my tenure as student government president, I began to use marijuana more frequently, and when I was no longer president and I was finishing my graduate studies for the semester, I was high more times than I was not.  With my job as president complete, my semester over, and no more teaching responsibilities, my focus became what in the hell should I do?

Life After Presidency and Graduate School

The huge question for me was what to do now that I was finished with being president of student government?  Do I continue with graduate school and get my MS in Rhetoric, or do I look for a job and start working?  Janet still had about a year to go before she would graduate, and we were in a serious relationship living together.  Should I take off to law school and have her catch up with me when she finishes her undergraduate degree?  My life was filled with indecision.  The one thing I knew for certain is that I now had virtually unlimited time on my hands – and idle hands are the Devil’s playground.  After much contemplation, I decided to not return to graduate school and to look for a job in Dallas, working there until Janet finished her degree and we could head off to law school.  I discovered finding a job that would challenge me to be a Herculean task.  I was either not interested in the potential job, or the job was what I considered not to be suitable for my background – I honestly had unrealistic expectations.  Eventually in the summer of 1989, I found a job working as a recruiter for a headhunting agency that sought job placements for people in the financial and accounting fields.  I was responsible for both finding employers that would pay a recruiting firm to fill job openings and finding candidates that would fit those positions.  Sometimes the fees were paid by the company, and sometimes they were paid by the candidate seeking the job – it just depended on the posting.  I was not thrilled with the job, but it was not going to be my career – I still intended on attending law school when Janet finished with her degree.  It was while I was working in Dallas, on November 9, 1989, that the Berlin Wall came tumbling down.  This was after the year prior the Soviets began their withdraw from Afghanistan and after a non-communist government was elected in Poland.  Other seismic changes in the world at this time included the free elections in Hungary and the Tiananmen Square protests and massacre in Beijing, China. I managed to work at the headhunting agency until the first part of December 1989.  In December 1989, I received a call from Samuel Goodwin, the Assistant Athletic Director at the University of North Texas, with whom I had worked on a couple of projects when I was the president of the student government who wanted to meet me on campus to discuss an opportunity in politics that I might be interested in.  We set up an appointment and I met him the very next day.  What I was told by Samuel Goodwin would potentially change my professional life forever.

Mark White for Governor, Houston, Texas (1990)

Who was Governor Mark White?

According to the Texas Politics Project Governors of Texas biography, Mark Wells White, Jr. was born in Henderson, Texas on March 17, 1940. He attended Houston public schools and Baylor University, earning a bachelor’s degree in business administration in 1962 and a law degree from Baylor Law School in 1965. After graduating from law school, Mark White worked briefly in a private legal practice in Houston before serving three years as an Assistant Attorney General. In 1969, he returned to Houston to private practice until 1973 when Governor Dolph Briscoe appointed him Secretary of State.

Mark White resigned as Secretary of State in October 1977 to run for Texas Attorney General. After being elected and serving as Attorney General from 1979 to 1983 (while I was in high school), he ran against and defeated Governor Bill Clements in the 1982 governor’s race. Governor Mark White served as head of the state from January 18, 1983, to January 20, 1987 (during the period I was debating at HBU and NTSU).

During his term in office, Governor White focused his energies on education reform (HB 72, including no-pass/no-play) and utility rate regulation. Governor White also concentrated on economic development and the appointment of minorities to positions on his staff and in the government. Texas’ Sesquicentennial occurred in 1986, and the Governor attended and hosted several events. The Goddess of Liberty was restored and planning for Capitol restoration began during Governor White’s term in office.

Governor White was defeated by former Governor Bill Clements in the 1986 election and returned to private life after his term ended in January 1987. Mark White and his wife Linda Gale Thompson have two sons and a daughter.

Mark White’s Return to Politics in 1989

In late 1989, Governor Mark White again decided to run for Governor of the State of Texas, and in the upcoming Democratic primary election campaign, he would face Attorney General Jim Maddox, and State Treasurer Ann Richards.  Ann Richard and rose to national political prominence by being the keynote speaker at the 1988 Democratic National Convention.  To embark on this gubernatorial campaign, the Mark White Campaign needed to hire a complete campaign staff ranging from campaign director, regional directors, volunteer coordinators, to various staffers including a campaign scheduler and an advance team director who also served as the runner or driver with similar duties to an Aide de Camp to a general officer in the miliary.

Search for Advance Team Director or Aide de Camp

For the 1990 gubernatorial election campaign, the Mark White Campaign looked to hire an individual to serve as the Advance Team Director or Aide de Camp to Governor White.  The aide would be responsible for picking up Governor White at his residence every day, ensuring he was at all scheduled events and rallies at the designated time, and delivering Governor White back to his residence at the end of the day.  Additionally, the aide would coordinate with the campaign scheduler for the upcoming events and travel, serve as the liaison between the statewide campaign and the local campaign volunteers for Governor White’s attendance at local and out-of-town events, fundraisers, and rallies, and take direction from the campaign headquarters.  The aide would accompany Governor White to all campaign events, ensuring that the schedule was adhered to, and that Governor White made it on time to each event every day.  Finally, since he would be the closest to the Governor, the aide served as the gatekeeper to communication with the candidate while on the road between campaign events, carry a cell phone (the Motorola bricks at the time), and place and receive important calls on behalf of the Governor during the campaign. One of the individuals the Mark White campaign called when looking for an aide, was Mr. Samuel Goodwin, the assistant athletic director for the University of North Texas, a former supporter and past activist for Governor White.

Meeting with the Assistant Athletic Director Mr. Goodwin

After receiving the call from Mr. Goodwin, the assistant athletic director at UNT, about an opportunity in politics, I eagerly met with him the next day.  I worked with Mr. Goodwin on many occasions as president of student government including during the Student Service Fee Committee’s consideration of the university football team’s budget. After getting to know him, I was given field passes to both home and away UNT football games. It was during this process that Mr. Goodwin and I came to know each other. During the meeting, I was told that Governor White was looking for an advance team coordinator or campaign aide.  Mr. Goodwin confirmed what he already knew; I was active in state politics as president of the student government and that I was a conservative Democrat with a similar political ideology of Governor Mark White.

The position of campaign aide to Governor White was thoroughly explained, including the importance of the job to maintaining the daily flow of the campaign and often serving as the sounding board to the candidate due to being with him 12 to 18 hours a day.  The primary election was scheduled for March 13, 1990, and if Governor White won the primary, the general election was scheduled for November 6, 1990. After discussing the aide’s job for about 30 minutes, I told Mr. Goodwin that I was very interested in the position, despite knowing if Governor White prevailed in the Democratic Primary, it would delay the start of law school another year.  On balance, I believed the opportunities from the job outweighed all disadvantages.  Mr. Goodwin said he would recommend me for the job, and that he would get back with me soon.  I gave him a copy of my resume, and returned to my apartment filled with excitement, anticipation, and fear that I might not be the ideal candidate for the job as an aide to Governor Mark White.

The Call Back – Scheduled Interview

I received a call from Mr. Goodwin the next day informing me that I would be interviewed for the job. I had no idea how many candidates were under consideration, but I was elated. Mr. Goodwin asked if I had a car, and if I was available tomorrow for an interview. I responded that I did have a car (1972 Mercury Marquis from my grandparents) and that I was available for an interview tomorrow. I was told to meet the campaign staff at the executive terminal at Dallas Love Field (I don’t recall the name of the company) at 0800.

The following day, I drove from Denton to Dallas Love Field’s executive terminal to meet with the Mark White’s campaign staff. When I arrived at the terminal, I met Mr. Max Milton, who introduced himself as one of the Mark White Campaign Managers. He asked me if I needed to be anywhere the rest of the day, and I said my plate was clear. He had me follow him to a private jet at the terminal and told me they were flying to Houston and if I could do the interview on the flight to Houston. I was shocked, but calmly said sure, that is no problem. As I followed Mr. Milton onto the plane, there were a half dozen people already seated, with Governor White in the next to the last seat on my left. Mr. Milton asked me to take the last seat at the back of the aircraft behind Governor White, and he took the seat next to mine at the back of the aircraft. I remember Mr. Milton and I talking about student government, my lobbying activities, college debate, and democratic politics. Mr. Milton asked me if I could move to Houston, how long it would take me to make the move if provided a furnished apartment by the campaign, and when I could start working. I told Mr. Milton that I could return to Dallas, pack a suitcase, and drive back to Houston the following day. Mr. Milton told me I would not need a car, as I would be provided with a campaign car if I got the job. I don’t recall everything we talked about, but it was a full conversation for the duration of the flight.

Governor White sat in his seat the entire time, not saying a single word. As we were landing at Hobby airport in Houston, Governor White turned around in his seat and looked at me and said, “I can forgive mistakes, but I can never forgive a lack of loyalty.” I just sat there, not knowing what to say, and I muttered something like “I understand,” or something equally uninspiring. We taxied to the executive terminal gate and all of us got off the aircraft and went into the terminal. Mr. Milton asked me if I needed for the campaign to purchase me a ticket back to Dallas, and despite not having extra money laying around, I said “no sir, I can do it.” As they gave me a ride to the main terminal, Mr. Milton said to call him later that night to see if I got the job. He gave me his number, and into the terminal I went.

The rest of the day is a blur. My ticket back to Dallas, the taxi ride to my car, the drive back to the apartment – all just one non-stop event. When I got back to the apartment, it was late afternoon. I was anxious, and wondered what exactly was meant by “later that night.” I was like a kid waiting for Santa Claus to come down the chimney. I waited until after 1800 and called Mr. Milton who answered the phone very quickly. I identified myself, and Mr. Milton asked me if I could travel to Houston tomorrow to start the job. I was elated! I told Mr. Milton that I would come to Houston tomorrow and be ready to start. He told me that the campaign would pay for the flight, and would pick me up at the airport and we would spend the day settling in. When I got off the phone, it felt like I had won the NDT and been elected the president of student government all rolled into one event. I informed Janet that night that I got the job and would be moving to Houston immediately to start the job. She was disappointed I was leaving so quickly, but also excited by the prospect of me working for Governor Mark White.

My Quick Move to Houston

The next day I packed my suitcase and headed to the airport to fly to Houston. I told Janet that I did not know when I would return, and we discussed the long-term implications of the job and where we would live. We left it up in the air because of the uncertainty of the election. One thing was certain – I was going to work as Governor Mark White’s campaign aide, and I would see Texas politics from the inside. I was met at Houston’s Hobby Airport by members of the campaign staff who drove me to Mr. Milton’s office. Mr. Milton gave me a temporary car as the official car for the campaign had yet to be picked up. He took me to the campaign apartment where I would be living and got me situated. He gave me some campaign literature, a Key Map (there was no GPS in those days) and a Motorola brick cell phone to use for Governor White. We talked more about the duties of the job, and he said we had a meeting the next morning with Governor White in his law office, and with the scheduling team. I was overwhelmed, but excited, nonetheless. Mr. Milton left telling me to be at Governor White’s office at 9:00am. I don’t think I slept a wink that night, and if I did, it was that light sleep zone where you are both asleep and awake at the same time.

Campaign Meeting at Governor White’s Office

We all met at Governor White’s office the following day: Governor White, Mr. Milton, Bart Simcox, the schedulers, other campaign staffers, and me.  I sat there in quiet observation as many topics were discussed including fundraising, campaign staffs in Dallas, Austin, San Antonio, the Rio Grande Valley, El Paso, and other smaller East Texas towns, and what was on the schedule for the following day.  The events for the following day were minimal; there were only three items of interest, all of them in Houston.  It was decided that I would go with Mr. Milton to get the campaign car after the meeting.  Before leaving, I met with the schedulers.  Although some people had email during that time, I did not, and the schedulers would get me copies of the upcoming schedule via fax – either sent to Governor White’s home office or to my campaign apartment.  At the close of the meeting, I got a copy of the schedule for the following day, and Governor White told me to pick him up at his house at 9:00am.  I left the meeting with Mr. Milton, and we went to pick up the campaign car, a black 1990 Oldsmobile 98 equipped with a car phone.  I drove to my campaign apartment, where I planned out the routes for the next day’s events for Governor White – If I did not know the route or could not effectively plan it using the Key Map, I would drive the route the night before to ensure that I could get the Governor to his appointments on time.  I eagerly awaited the next day, my first with the Governor alone.

First Day with Governor White

I was at the Governor’s house well before 9:00am and parked the car outside on the street and just waited there for the time to reach 9:00am.  I was struck by the neighborhood: it was a gated community with mansions – not just big houses, but real mansions.  Governor White’s house was a sprawling two story complex with what looked like two wings.  I had only seen pictures of places like that before and had never been to such a house.  It was somewhat intimidating.  When the hour approached 9:00am and got out of the car and went to the front door.  As I rang the bell a nice woman answered the door.  I would later find out that it was Governor White’s wife, Linda Gale.  She invited me in and had me wait for the Governor in his office – it was a huge room with a personal library.  At one end of the office was a huge ornate desk, and there were two sitting areas in the office, one on each side.  I took a seat in an overstuffed chair in one of the sitting areas.  It was only a matter of minutes that Governor White walked in the officer and asked if I was ready to go.

Without hesitation, I got up and walked to meet him at the entrance of the office.  He led me through the dining room and to the kitchen, where he drank something and headed out the kitchen door exiting the house.  This was in the opposite wing of the house from where I had entered.  We walked out of the house, past his personal cars, and to the awaiting Oldsmobile.  As we got into the car, Governor White did a brief inspection – looking at the features of the car and eased himself in the front passenger seat.  We drove off to his first appointment.  I don’t remember the conversation exactly, but he was asking questions about my background, what I wanted to do when I “grew-up” and where I was from.  He asked if I knew where I was going to, which I replied positively and continued driving – he discovered the car phone and asked me if I had the number, which I had written down on my schedule.  He made a phone call and talked on the phone for the remainder of the trip to the appointment.

When we arrived at the appointment, I let him out at the main office door and went to park the car.  I then went inside the office and waited for him at the receptionist desk in the front lobby.  This was typical of how appointments would work.  About a third of the time Governor White would take the appointment by himself, and about the other two-thirds of the time he would have me escorted into the meeting when I arrived.  I always preferred going into the meetings because I could keep an eye on the time, and shuttle Governor White out on time to make the next appointment.  As we learned each other’s tendencies, when Governor White wanted to have the ability to quickly leave a meeting, he would insist on me being present – when he wanted to take the time regardless of the schedule, he would have me wait outside.

The day was relatively unremarkable.  I shuttled him to his appointments, waited for his meeting to end, and then drove him to his next appointment.  If he wanted to add something to the schedule, he would coordinate with me, and if he wanted more time in a meeting, he would have me contact the next appointment to let them know when our anticipated arrival time would be.  Sometimes I would coordinate this through the schedulers and sometime directly with the party with whom we had the appointment.  I remember the day ending early, before 5:00pm, and I was driving him home.  We had a bid day planned the following day as we were flying to Dallas for a couple of days to attend a couple of campaign events and meet with donors.  I do recall on the ride home, we started talking about law school and I told him I intended to attend at the conclusion of the campaign – he talked about his law school days, and what it was like at Baylor.  He asked me where I wanted to go to law school, and I replied that I was probably going to attend South Texas College of Law to focus on advocacy.  He started grinning and asked me, “Do you know what they call a person who graduates last in their law school class?”  I looked at him with a puzzled look and replied that I did not.  He looked me in the eye and said, “They call me Governor!”  I could not believe the Governor was cracking jokes with me.  He went on to tell me that he did do well in law school, but it is not what you do in law school that matters, it is what you do when you are finished with law school that matters.

I got the Governor to his house well before dinnertime, and he told me that is all he needed from me for the day.  He said to pick him up at 5:00am the next day and we would drive to the Hull Executive Airport in Sugarland to fly to Dallas.  I dropped him off and returned to my campaign apartment to prepare for the following day.

Prepping for Out-of-Town Travel to Dallas

When I got back to the campaign apartment, my task was to prepare for the following day.  When there was out-of-town travel on the schedule, which happened more than half of the time, I would coordinate with the local campaign staff to ensure that there was nothing that was needed from us to make the operation run smoothly at the travel location.  This usually entailed calling the local coordinator and ensuring all arrangements had been made for our arrival at their location.  It was the responsibility of the local campaign staff to have ground transportation arranged, and the local events coordinated.

In preparing for our trip to Dallas, I noticed that the event coordinator for the trip was none other than the assistant athletic director at UNT, Mr. Samuel Goodwin.  I called Mr. Goodwin to confirm that all the arrangements were made for our arrival in Dallas the following day.  When I was talking to Mr. Goodwin, he asked me if I knew anyone who could assist with driving the campaign team to our various meetings in Dallas over the course of the next couple of days.  One name immediately popped into my head: Kyle Garrison.  I told Mr. Goodwin that I knew someone who could help, told him briefly about Kyle, and said that I would talk to Kyle and have him call you within the next couple of hours.  After the conversation with Mr. Goodwin, I immediately called Kyle to see if this was something he would be interested in doing.  It took no convincing to get Kyle on board.  That night Kyle called Mr. Goodwin, and they planned for our Dallas transportation.  Ultimately, Kyle went to work for the campaign in Dallas, and worked with the Dallas office for the duration of the campaign and election.

Picking Up the Governor for Our Trip to Dallas and Developing a Routine

I arrived at the Governor’s house before 5:00am and right on time the Governor emerged from the house.  We drove the 20 miles (30 minutes) to Hull Airport (now the Sugar Land Regional Airport) to catch our flight to Dallas where we met other members of our traveling team.  Different donors would “donate” their aircraft for campaign use – and these aircraft included various models of Gulfstreams, Lear Jets, Sabreliner jets.  We would fly these aircraft throughout the state to different campaign locations, and today we were heading to Dallas for a couple of days. We occasionally would fly commercial flights between Houston and Dallas or Austin and when we did, Governor White was like a rockstar walking through the airport constantly being stopped, or encouraged, and talked to, shaking countless hands of supporters and people he knew.  Governor White taught me an excellent campaign lesson when he said, “never pass a restroom without washing your hands.”  With the number of people with whom he shook hands daily, Governor White was always washing his hands.

We arrived in Dallas early, able to attend the breakfast meetings that were on the schedule.  I enjoyed the days we traveled: the local campaign was responsible for making sure that the Governor and his travel team made it to all appointments, and it was my job to just keep the Governor on schedule and accompany him to all events, meetings, and fundraisers.  So, for the next couple of days, the Dallas campaign office arranged for our transportation to all events on the schedule.  The Dallas team met us at the airport, and I was elated to see that Kyle was the main driver for that team.  We were met by Kyle and the Dallas County campaign coordinator who took us to a campaign breakfast where Governor White was to meet with various campaign donors.  This trip was primarily a fundraising mission.  Scheduled were lunches and dinners with individuals and groups of people who had committed to contributing to the campaign.  I remember that we were dined at the finest restaurants in Dallas by some of the most influential people in North Texas – I remember meeting one donor at his office before dinner, and we took his car and driver to the restaurant – it was the first time I had ever been in a Royals Royce and the first time I dined at a Michelin 5-Star restaurant.  It was easy to see that the campaign trail was filled with great and plentiful food, and weight gain was almost a certainty.  The time in Dallas was filled with eating, drinking, and conversations about the upcoming election.

After a couple days in Dallas, we returned to Houston, taking the Gulfstream back to Hull Airport after a campaign dinner.  One of the things about Governor White – he enjoyed a nice Scotch or two after the conclusion of the day’s campaign activities.  His favorite was the Famous Grouse blended Scotch whiskey.  There was usually a bottle of Famous Grouse on the plane for our return to Houston, and before take-off, I would fix the Governor a drink, which he may or may not refill before we arrived in Houston.  After arriving at Hull Airport, I would then drive him home, return to my campaign apartment, and repeat the campaigning the next day.  This was the routine we found ourselves in until the election, just with different destinations, different hosts, different campaign events, and different donors and voters.

Personal Time with Governor Mark White

During the campaign, Governor White and I had countless hours where we were alone together, whether in the car, on the plane, or in his office when I dropped him off at night.  Towards the end of the campaign, during the final six-weeks, it was not uncommon for Governor White to invite me into his study to get a copy of the schedule for the next day and talk for 10 to 20 minutes as he sipped on his final drink of the night.  This time together was often used to talk about things other than the campaign: his children, outlook on current events of the day, and plans when he became Governor again.  We discussed my upbringing, and many of the things that stood in my way of achieving what I had achieved up to that point in my life.  I was 25 years old at the time, and intended to go to law school when the campaign was over.  Governor White would remind me that it is good to have goals and a plan, but it is important to be flexible and react to the opportunities you are presented in life.  It was during these very personal conversations that Governor White told me he saw me with a prominent role in Government should he win the election.  His favorite quote to me was, “Will, if I win this election, I am going to slip you in my pocket and take you with me.”  These conversations always left me feeling fantastic – going from an abused, neglected, picked on kid, to someone who the Governor of Texas wanted to keep close to him – go figure.

The Final Stages of the Campaign

As the election campaign was at its fevered pitch less than three weeks before the March 13, 1990, vote, we were carefully following our internal polling – the three candidates Jim Mattox, Ann Richards and the Governor were all within three percentage point of each other, and in a statistical tie, each garnering about 30% of the vote in polls.  We were certain no individual candidate would garner over 50% of the vote, and a run-off election was imminent.  The key was to be one of the top two vote getters, and then win the runoff election to be held about a month after the primary election.

This is where we spent our advertising money.  Governor White had refused to be drawn into the allegations made by Jim Mattox against Ann Richards, that she had used cocaine while serving in public office in Texas and had a secret drug problem.  While in public office, in 1980 Ann Richards entered an alcohol treatment facility and reportedly had been sober ever since.  Governor White insisted on taking the high road and not attacking either of his democratic opponents, but rather focusing on what he would bring to the table.  This was directly opposed to what our national political consultants were advising:  that we spend the final three weeks attacking our political rivals, while distinguishing ourselves as “proven leadership” with the track record to stand up to special interests.  Governor White refused to attack either Jim Maddox or Ann Richards.  The focus would be on “law and order,” and proven experience as the former Governor of Texas.

With a little over two weeks before the election day, Ann Richards was not as kind to her democratic rivals – she launched vicious attack ads on television and radio against both Jim Maddox and Governor Mark White – apparently, she would go to any length to make the runoff and secure the democratic nomination.  Her attack against Governor White was particularly ruthless, unfair, and a bold-faced lie – in television and radio ads, she accused the Governor of getting rich while serving as the Governor from 1983 to 1987.  She said “Mark White lined his pockets with taxpayer money” to build his personal wealth and pay for the mansion in which he now lives.  She had pictures of his sprawling house in her ads with comments that such a home was not affordable to anyone who had served as governor, and the only way he could afford it was by stealing from the taxpayers.  We were stunned – there was no support for such allegations, and they completely ignored the fact that Governor White was a partner level contributor to a large Houston law firm, bringing with him all the connections, contacts, and knowledge he gained while serving as Governor.  This type of rainmaking capabilities brought a handsome salary at any large Texas law firm, where he had worked for the past three years after leaving the Governor’s Mansion in 1987.  The problem remained that refuting the “attack ads” would merely have you treading water and shifted the focus to the attacks themselves.  The Governor’s strategy was to remain on the course – despite the devastating effect these ads were having on our polling numbers.  Our consultants predicted that the ads would cost us about a point each day they went unrefuted – a reality that would show itself on election day.

Election Day Activities and Return Watching

By the time election day was upon us, we were deeply concerned about the effect of Ann Richard’s negative campaign against Governor White.  We remained optimistic that the voters would see through the lies, and reward Governor White for his positive campaign and substantial political experience.  After the final day, where the Governor and Linda Gale cast their ballots, all that was left to do was wait.  There was no real campaigning while the polls were open, so all that could be done is to live a normal day – unfortunately none of us had lived a normal day since before December 1989.  I imagined at the time that this is what it must feel like when you are waiting for a jury to return a verdict.  I spent the day with Governor White as he remained low-keyed and spent most of the day on the phone with friends and colleagues wishing him well.  The campaign headquarters had reserved a suite at a downtown hotel for watching the returns, and reserved the ballroom which that night was filled with campaign staff, volunteers, and supporters waiting on the election returns.  In the suite, there were three televisions set up, each tuned to a different channel to follow the returns.  Occupants of the suite were Governor White and his family, including Linda Gale, his top campaign manager, and his political consultant.  Of course, I was there too.  The comings and goings from the suite were tightly controlled, with only very few people granted access to the Governor during the election returns.  I would shuttle back and forth to the ballroom to make sure everything was set up – it was a party atmosphere in the ballroom with supporters and volunteers seeing this as the event that all their hard work was for.  I made sure the podium was ready for any speech that Governor White would be making that night.  I also prepositioned the car behind the hotel in a loading zone, so it was easily accessible – the hotel staff gave me permission to park anywhere I wanted.

It did not take long for us to see the writing on the wall.  A couple of hours after the polls closed, the election results started to roll in, and as our consultants predicted, the attack ads of Ann Richards hit us hard during the election.  Governor White was a distant third behind Ann Richards and Jim Mattox.  With the experience of many elections under his belt, Governor White wasted no time in calling the election.  Convinced he was out of the election, he made his way down to the ballroom flanked by his family, the campaign manager and myself.  He entered the ballroom to the cheer of his supporters and campaign staff, and walked directly to the podium where he wasted no time conceding the election to the disappointment of the room full of supporters.  He peeled off from the rest of the campaign staff, and I escorted the Governor and his family through the back passages of the hotel to where I had the car waiting.  He told his family that he would see them at the house, and they left to return home in the vehicle Linda Gale had driven to the campaign hotel.  Governor White got into the car, and I was in the driver seat – we sat there silently for a brief moment before Governor White looked at me and said, “Will, take me home.”  We did not talk on the 10-minute drive to his house.  When I pulled up to the house, Governor White said, “thanks for everything Will, pick me up tomorrow at 10:00am and let’s go to my law office.”  I told him I would see him in the morning, and to have a good night.  I then drove to my campaign apartment and decompressed – calling Janet to say it was over.  The final tally – Mark White 19.38%, Jim Maddox 38.72%, and Ann Richards 39.01%.

Navigating the Election Aftermath

Struggling to hold back a tide of emotions, I found myself pulling up to Governor Mark White’s residence around 9:45am, taking a moment to collect myself before his arrival. Like clockwork, the Governor emerged from his home at 10:00am, in what appeared as a good mood. Our conversation en route to the office was light-hearted as he joked about the unexpected turn of the election. Once at the office, I watched him express his heartfelt gratitude to his supporters over the phone.

About 10 minutes into our office meeting, Governor White received an intriguing proposition over a call from Texas Senator Phil Gramm. Elected to the Senate in 1984 after switching from the Democratic to the Republican party, Senator Gramm extended an invitation for Governor White to do the same, with the assurance of an uncontested run in the next U.S. Senate election. This proposition was promptly echoed in a subsequent call from the State Chairman of the Republican Party. The Governor, in his characteristic politeness, listened attentively and promised to return their calls. Piqued by these conversations, I asked the Governor about his thoughts on the offers, noting his conservative Democratic values that aligned more with current Republican principles. He firmly dismissed the idea, expressing unwavering loyalty to the Democratic Party that had stood by him, irrespective of the rift with Ann Richards.

Our conversation turned towards the inevitable winding down of the campaign. Governor White directed me to liaise with Max Milton to relinquish the campaign car and apartment. While not an immediate requirement, he expressed the need to wrap up our campaign activities in a timely manner. As the day ended and I drove him home, little did I know that it would be my last encounter with Governor Mark White until 1995, after my law school graduation.

While practicing in Houston, I was on a date at a very exclusive restaurant called the Palms.  I was eating dinner there with my date, when Mark White walked in with a group of men and sat at a table at the other end of the restaurant.  As he was sitting down, he saw me from across the dining room.  He did not take his seat but walked over to my table.  I stood and shook his hand and greeted him.  We exchanged pleasantries, and I introduced him to my date.  He said he needed to get back to the table, and as he was walking off, he turned back around and said, “by the way, why are you in an adult restaurant like this anyway?”  I just smiled and said I would talk to him later.  The next time I would see Governor Mark White was when he was lying in state in the State Capitol after dying from a heart attack on August 5, 2017.

As for Ann Richards, I was disappointed she received the democratic nomination in 1990, and disappointed that she was elected Governor of Texas later that November.  I was glad to see her defeated by George W. Bush in the following election.  I knew that she was motivated by self-dealing, selfishness, and would do things that would ultimately benefit her, not the state – we did not see another candidate with that type of blatant self-interest until many years later in the 2015 presidential election.  I withdrew from politics after this election experience, and never again took an active role in Texas or national politics.  Ann Richards died on September 13, 2006, when I was stationed in Vicenza, Italy.  I did not shed a tear.

Closing the Chapter

In the following week, I worked with Max Milton to handle the practicalities of the campaign’s dissolution, including returning the car and vacating the campaign apartment. Although the immediate future seemed uncertain, Max offered invaluable assistance, leading to my subletting his Houston apartment and welcoming Janet’s move within a week. Our relationship gradually rekindled, picking up where we had left off prior to my work with Governor White’s campaign.

To help me out before law school, Governor White secured a job for me at a local public relations firm run by one of his supporters. With this temporary job in place, I was set to start my law studies that August of 1990 at South Texas College of Law.

South Texas College of Law Houston, Houston, Texas (August 1990 – May 1993)

Before Starting Law School

After the election campaign of Governor Mark White, I worked at the public relations firm of Goodwin, Dannenbaum, Littman, and Wingfield (GDLW) marking time until the start of law school.  I worked on law-related client portfolios such as the Texas Trial Lawyers Association (TTLA).  I worked at GDLW from March 15, 1990, until the start of law school on August 13, 1990.  I had chosen South Texas College of Law because it was a nationally recognized law school for its advocacy program, and I wanted to be a trial lawyer.

My First Year of Law School – “One L”

Entering law school with me at STCL were two of my good friends from the UNT debate program: Kyle Garrison and Kevin Wolverton.  It was great to have my best friend Kyle and my very good friend Kevin as classmates when law school started.  It helped keep the “first year butterflies” to a minimum and gave me an instant study group with which to start.  I was living with Janet in an apartment in west Houston, and usually shared a ride with Kevin to school since we lived in the same apartment complex.  I took law school very seriously the first semester and performed very well on my final exams, achieving an overall GPA of 84 landing me on the Dean’s Honor List and an invitation to the law review.  Kyle on the other hand did not perform nearly as well, and in part because of his disappointment with his grades, quit law school and established a political consulting firm in North Texas.  Janet and I got married during the winter break between the first and second semester of my first year in law school.  After we married, we moved to Houston Heights, and I got a job working for a small plaintiff’s personal injury firm: the Law Office of Danforth Helms.  With my attention divided between work and trying to balance life as a husband, I did not fair quite as good during my second semester, however remained in good academic standing.

My Second Year of Law School – “Two L”

Our relationship was strained from the outset.  Janet had “forced” me to marry her by threatening to break-up with me as I prepared for my first semester of finals if I did not agree to get married.  I agreed and was uncomfortable with it from the outset.  By the beginning of my second year of law school, I was completely neglectful at home.  However, I was now focused on advocacy.  Unable to compete in advocacy during your first year at STCL, I was now excited to start my second year at STCL – I participated in both mock trial and moot court.  This was the reason I chose to attend STCL.  While I performed adequately in moot court, my passion was with mock trial – where I spent countless hours preparing for our competition in Nashville, Tennessee.  On the team was Kevin, Albert Bradshaw, Blair Stockton, and me.  Kevin and I were the lawyers, and Albert and Blair were our witnesses. We drew close to all of the members of the team, and when we traveled to Nashville, a relationship with Blair blossomed.  When I returned home, completely unsatisfied with my relationship with Janet, I asked for a divorce having been married less than 14 months.

Divorcing Janet: Unexpected Upheaval

What I did not anticipate was that Janet would call my ex-wife Kirsten, and they would become fast friends, with Janet disclosing my marijuana use habits.  At this point, I was smoking marijuana daily, including before classes.  Kirsten used my marijuana smoking as an excuse to deny me visitation with my daughter, Lauren, and within a couple of months disappeared with her, effectively kidnapping her – it would be a couple of years before I was able to locate her and demand visitation.

Falling in Love with Blair: My New Focus

In the meantime, I immediately started dating Blair after returning from Nashville in February 1992.  This was not seen positively by the advocacy department, and I was effectively cutoff from participating in future competitions.  While I was disappointed, my newfound love for Blair overshadowed any negative consequences resulting from the relationship.  Having lived with Kevin and his wife Sophia Franklin-Wolverton for several months after leaving Janet, I moved into my own garage apartment in the Rice University neighborhood. My focus was on dating Blair, working for Danforth Helms, and completing my law school studies in that order.  I completed my second year of law school, again finding my way onto the Dean’s Honor List in the Fall of 1991.

My Third Year of Law School – “Three L”

My final year of law school saw another UNT debate friend enroll at STCL: Marcus Caperton.  Marcus had finished his master’s degree at UNT and was hired by HBU to be a communication professor and debate coach the year prior.  He decided to enter law school in the fall of 1992.  While he was teaching at HBU, Marcus and I formed a jury consulting firm, combining our communication expertise, debate experience, and legal knowledge to advise trial lawyers on jury selection.  I did this in addition to my work with Danforth Helms’ personal injury practice.  Between these endeavors, and spending time with Blair and classes, I was overextended my final year at STCL.  I managed to continue to make good grades in school, despite my daily use of marijuana, and graduated from STCL in May 1993 in the top 25% of the class.  It was during this final year of law school, that John’s mother reached out to me asking for help with John.  She said that he was getting to the age where he needed a positive male role model in his life, and that now was the time I needed to step up.  I was not able to give her or John what was needed, and I made no efforts to do so.  Lauren was still missing with her mother Kirsten, and I was trying to complete my final year of law school.  I did not have any expendable money, and I brushed the request off — neatly boxing up what had been securely stored in my emotional safe, and not thinking about it again.

Law Office of Chapin L. Broussard, Houston, Texas

The Allen Wayne Janecka Case

In February 1993, I quit working at the jury consulting firm and the Law Office of Danforth Helms to take a job with the Law Office of Chapin L. Broussard to serve as a clerk/briefing attorney on a capital murder case.  Mr. Broussard had been appointed to represent Allen Wayne Janecka in the retrial of a capital murder case that had been overturned by the Texas Court of Criminal Appeals, and I was hired to draft all the pretrial motions in the retrial.  This was a very high-profile case in the Houston area, as it involved the murder of a well-to-do Houston family by a brother to inherit money from the family where the mother had been murdered a few years prior.  Our client, Allen Wayne Janecka, was the accused “hit man” in the murder of the family, including an 18-month child.  With the family murdered, the brother, Markum Duff-Smith would be the sole heir to his mother’s estate and take it all. Markun Duff-Smith had been convicted of hiring Allen Wayne Janecka as the “hit man” and was sitting on death row awaiting execution.  A book had been written about the case, which had been previously tried four years prior, and for which Allen Wayne Janecka had been convicted, and was sitting on death row.

Focusing on the Retrial of Allen Wayne Janecka

After being hired on the Janecka case, I spent every waking hour working on preparing for the retrial.  Everything became secondary, including Blair.  This is where I fell in love with criminal defense work.  In did the minimum to complete my classes and graduate in May 1993, and I only took two weeks off to study for the Bar Exam in late July 1993.  I continued to smoke marijuana daily, and even provided it to Chapin Broussard, 30 years my senior.  My marijuana use was so pervasive that I was smoking all day, every day, and continued to smoke when preparing for the Bar Exam – on the testing days, I was stoned before taking the Bar Exam, and during breaks, went to the car with my study partner and got high for the next session of the examination.  This continued all three days of the Bar Exam.  Immediately after completing the Bar Exam, I went back to work preparing for the trial that was set for mid-October 1993.  The case took a couple of weeks to try, and on Oct. 28, 1993, Allan Wayne Janecka was again found guilty of capital murder.  The sentencing case ensued, and on November 4, 1993, Janecka was sentenced to death again.  I found out I passed the Bar Exam on November 2, 1993, and the first person to congratulate me in person was Allen Wayne Janecka.

Proposal to Open my own Criminal Defense Practice

During the preparation for the trial, in September 1993, Mr. Dolph D. McNair approached me about forming my own law firm specializing in state criminal defense.  He proposed that he would refer me to all his state criminal defense cases, in return for me referring him to all my federal criminal defense cases.  He suggested that I take a full-page advertisement out in the Houston Yellow Pages (before the advent of legal websites), a $65,000 annual investment at the time, and that I do advertising in local newspapers. Finally, he suggested that I open my office in the office space he rented on the 62nd floor of the Texas Commerce Tower (now the JPMorgan Chase Tower). I mulled his proposal over for a considerable amount of time, and when the Allen Wayne Janecka trial ended, I agreed to and opened Helixon and Wolverton, LLC, as Kevin Wolverton agreed to join me in this venture, where we continued to do work for Chapin L. Broussard in the capacity of our new criminal defense practice.

Helixon & Wolverton, LLC, Houston, Texas

Opening the Office: Appearances Mattered

 Our first order of business was to outfit the new high-rise offices with furniture and remodel them to create the illusion of success.  Mr. McNair was very adamant that we install custom floors, fresh paint, and adorn the offices with classic and expensive-looking furniture. He believed that if you create the illusion of success, then clients will want to pay top dollar to you for your representation.  The problem was neither Kevin nor I had thousands of dollars to spend decorating and furnishing our offices, and we were brand new, freshly minted attorneys. We sublet our offices, similarly to what Mr. McNair did, from the larger law firm of Melton, Knox, & Wilson, a business law firm with about 10-15 lawyers.  They were the firm that leased the office space from Texas Commerce Towers.  Luckily, Chapin L. Broussard had a lot of extra office furniture, including old desks from Governor John Connolly, that would fit the role perfectly.  Mr. Broussard agreed to give us the desks for use in our offices on the condition that we would return them when we no longer needed them.  We spent every penny we had making our skyrise offices look the part, and for me, I had a corner office on the sixty-second floor overlooking downtown Houston. By all appearances, it was the office of a wildly successful attorney bringing in top dollars from its clients for representation.  With the money spent on the office space and advertising, Kevin and I needed paying clients, and fast.

Case Start to Come In: McNair’s Referrals Begin

The Yellow Page Advertising campaign would not begin for a few months due to the publication date of the Yellow Page book.  The newspaper advertising campaigns were starting to bear some fruit, but the immediate cases came from Mr. McNair. In addition to Mr. McNair’s referrals, I was hustling in the courthouse in different courts for court appointments to make ends meet.  Of course, the court-appointments were competitive since there was already a slew of criminal defense lawyers in the wings seeking such appointments – all of whom had more experience that Kevin or me.  Slowly, cases started to come in, and my first trial was at the end of November 1993.  It was a constructive possession of cocaine case, where my client was accused of possessing cocaine because police officers found cocaine residue in the driver’s seat of the vehicle in which he was arrested.  The police were suspicious of the driver because he was sitting in the parking lot of a strip club in his car for several minutes.  When he got out, he was questioned, and the police developed probable cause to search his vehicle.  Upon searching the vehicle, cocaine residue in the driver’s seat was discovered.  The lead district attorney, Anna Kruger, was a seasoned felony prosecutor, and was not interested in a plea bargain that did not carry with it at least a year in jail since this was not my client’s first rodeo.  The client insisted on his innocence and demanded that we take the case to trial.  All the debates, mock trials, and case preparation does not ease the anxiety associated with your first “real” jury trial, especially since I did not have much time to prepare.  After picking a jury, we spent two days trying the case, and after less than two hours of deliberations, the jury returned with a “not guilty” verdict.  I was ecstatic.  My very first jury trial was an acquittal, and Anna congratulated me on the verdict, although she would not forget it when she became a district court judge the following year.

Getting into a Rhythm: Chapin Broussard’s Help

In addition to the referrals from Mr. McNeil, we were getting some referrals from Chapin Broussard.  Combined with our advertising, we were able to make our monthly expenses, with barely enough left over to pay ourselves.  After a few months, court appointments were happening more regularly, and we had a moderate case load requiring our attendance in court at least a few times a week.  By mid-summer, we were in a groove, a steady stream of clients, and regular court appearances, including a few jury trials.  In the first few months of my practice, I had garnered acquittals in all my first cases, with a string of four straight victories.  I was beginning to think this was too easy.  We started to make money, with enough to bring some home – the problem is that it was not a steady, reliable stream of income.  We waited with anticipation for the phone to ring daily, and that created a stress that I had never been exposed to before.  It was difficult to rely solely on your own advertising and referrals for business because you just did not know when the next client would walk through the doors.  If the business stress was not enough, I would soon be hit with a shock in my personal life.

Unforeseen Breakup and my Second Heartbreak

Blair and I had been dating for over two and a half years, and from all appearances it was going great.  She was working for a small Houston firm, and we spent most of our extra time together.  I had recently brought up the idea of moving in together and was thinking about getting married, and I was “all in” in this relationship.  It had not been since my first girlfriend in high school, Summer, that I had fully given my heart to a relationship.  Even in my marriages I kept something in the reserve tank for self-protection.  On a warm late-spring evening, Blair was going to meet me at my apartment, and we were going to go on a typical date – dinner and maybe some drinks. When she arrived, it was “no-nonsense.”  She walked into the apartment, looked at me, and said we should not see each other anymore. I was not sure she was serious, despite all the signs, and said “what?” She repeated herself, adding that it was over, and turned and left.  I was in shock.  I could not believe what happened.  To say I went into some level of hysertia would be an understatement.  I remember moving all my furniture in my apartment into the back yard of the main house, and playing “Everybody Hurts,” by R.E.M. on a loop sitting outside, getting high and drinking.  It was a few days later, my neighbor Deborah Phillips said, “enough is enough,” and forced me to interact with other people – and slowly brought me back to life.  This, like the breakup with Summer at the time, was debilitating, and affected every aspect of my life, including work.

Appearance of Normality and Heavy Partying

By mid-summer, things appeared to be normal.  I was back to fully functioning at the office, trying cases, and doing my best to run a business.  Our Yellow Pages ad was running, and we were getting a litany of calls and potential clients.  The problem with a criminal defense practice is most potential clients do not have the money to pay substantial attorney’s fees despite wanting to pay such fees.  We did everything we could to accommodate clients, including accepting payment plans.  The firm was profitable, but we were not making the money that associate lawyers were making at large law firms in Houston – to some we were squeaking by, what I learned was a way of life for many criminal defense lawyers.  After the break-up with Blair, I found myself out almost every night drinking and getting high.  My typical evening would start with meeting Mr. Broussard at a local bar with a few judges he drank with, which usually included Judge Woody Densen and Judge Booker Buttons.  After a couple of hours with what I considered “the old men” at the time, I would go to bars with a younger crowd – drinking and socializing until near closing time unless I had a reason to leave earlier.  I would make it to the office the next morning by 10:00am, unless I had a court appearance, and I would go directly there.  This became my routine for months.

Meeting Kendall and the Easing of my Partying

Towards the end of the summer of 1994, I met Kendall Hennas through a friend.  We all went to a Houston Astros baseball game, and then out to a Houston bar called the Pig and Whistle “inside the loop” in Houston. Kendall was a labor and delivery nurse who worked night shift.  We hit it off immediately, and within a short period of time began dating.  I soon limited my time out in the bars to those three or four nights a week Kendall worked and focused on spending the rest of my time with her.  This was the perfect relationship: a girlfriend with wonderful parents who I loved spending time with and a free three to four nights a week to act single and crazy in the bars.  By this time, the owner of the Pig & Whistle had been arrested on a cocaine charge and was facing licensing issues with his bar.  I took his case and was able to get the charges dismissed on a search violation, and as a bonus, I was given a “lifetime” open tab at the bar.  All the bartenders and waiters got to know me, and Pig & Whistle was my home away from home.

DUI Cases Became my Staple

Everyone got to know me at the Pig & Whistle, and it was no time before I was getting at least a new DUI case every week, either through the bartenders, waiters, owner, or other regular patrons. It seemed the best way to get alcohol-related defense cases was, in fact, to be a regular patron at a bar.  I would also pick up the drug possession cases that often went “hand in hand” with the DUI cases.  While most of these cases would plead out, I wound up trying a half a dozen DUI cases to a jury, winning every single one.  The only DUI case I lost was a felony DUI I picked up as a court-appointment, and it was my client’s 10th arrest for DUI, and he had five previous convictions and spent five years in prison for felony DUI.  Even that case was a “win” because he was only sentenced to three years in prison for this most recent DUI.  It was during this time that I also started representing friends that had been arrested for DUIs and drug possession cases.  Representing friends was a bit trickier, as they wanted deals on the payment of attorney fees and wanted a clean outcome.  While I was mostly successful in my friend’s cases, they came with added stress and headache.  By the new year, things were looking good for me in the practice, and I always had money in my pocket – often cash from the payment of attorney fees in cash.  I was the perfect boyfriend on the nights Kendall was not working, and the worst boyfriend on her nights at the hospital.  This had become my routine.

The St. Valentine’s Day Massacre

I am not sure of the exact date, but in the middle of February 1995, Kevin called me to his office and informed me he was leaving the practice.  Apparently, spending most of his time in the office had paid off, and the larger firm of Melton, Knox, & Wilson, offered him a full-time job as an associate attorney.  Kevin sought the security of working with a firm and had loathed the month-to-month uncertainty of running our own practice.  I was shocked and devastated.  Kevin was a long-time friend, and I felt his leaving the firm was abandoning me, again.  I had not felt this emptiness in my stomach since I discovered that Kevin would be debating with Kyle while we were in college.  I felt a sense of betrayal, despite all the help Kevin and his wife Sophia had extended to me in my divorce with Janet. I was in a jam.  Do I stay in the office where Kevin was now an associate, and try to make the firm succeed on my own?  Do I move to a more affordable office and try to reduce expenses to make it work as a solo practitioner?  Do I look for another individual to partner with and continue my efforts?  Or do I just give up and look for a full-time legal job like Kevin had landed?  The unfortunate truth was that nobody was willing to give me a full-time firm job and I would have to do it on my own – but how was the question.  Within a week, I was referred to an older plaintiff’s personal injury lawyer named Jack “John” Helm who had an office outside the loop on the Northwest Freeway.  Jack was thirty years older than me, and seemed to have an established personal injury practice and was interested in expanding into criminal law with a partner.  I met with him that week, and after a lengthy discussion, I agreed to partner with him forming Helixon & Helm, LLC. By the beginning of March 1995, I had moved out of the Texas Commerce Tower downtown and was officing with Jack in an office building on the Northwest Freeway, fifteen to thirty minutes from the downtown courts depending on the traffic.

Helixon & Helm, LLC, Houston, Texas (March 1995 – April 1996)

Seamless Transition to New Practice

 As far as the actual day-to-day practice, not much changed from closing Helixon & Wolverton, LLC, and opening Helixon & Helm, LLC. Of course, I no longer saw Kevin on a virtually daily basis, and instead on most days I saw Jack.  Jack was not a criminal lawyer, so talking about cases with him was not much help, other than to allow me to talk it through in my own mind. He was occupied with a few main clients that he serviced, and new personal injury cases that would find its way to his desk – he did not advertise, and all his leads were generated through his past clients and legal network developed over his three decades of practice in the Houston area.  I had the Yellow Page ads fully running, and even agreed to renew the full-page ad for another year.  Again, there were not really any websites in 1995 for law firms (the first law firm website was launched in March 1994 by Venable) and they did not become popular until the turn of the 21st century.  Most people who did not know an attorney or get a personal reference would use the Yellow Pages for selecting an attorney. There were no competing directories to speak of – you either advertised in the Yellow Pages or you did not – there were no alternatives.  For a full-page color ad in the 1995 Yellow Pages, the cost was about $65,000 for the year, amortized at about $5,500 a month – this was not a minor expense.  The ad was generating enough revenue to pay for itself, and enough money to keep me floating, although not swimming in cash.  I continued to try cases, negotiate plea agreements, and pick up court appointments, which kept me busy with the day-to-day practice of law.  By the end of 1995, I had tried about a dozen jury trials with all but three resulting in acquittals or hung juries.

Game Changing New Case

Shortly after forming Helixon & Helm, LLC, I received a call from a potential new client from my Yellow Page advertisement.  The case involved a lawsuit in Staten Island where the potential new client had released their lawyer on a medical malpractice case that was already filed and in the court system – amazingly, the prior lawyer did not retain any interest in the case or its ultimate attorney fees.  I was skeptical, why would a case in New York be in the system and the plaintiff’s attorney be released without retaining any interest in the ultimate attorney fees.  I did not make sense to me, so I had the potential new clients meet me in the office for an in-person consultation as soon as possible.

Meeting with the Stover Clients: Making the Case

Mr. Franklin and Ms. Maggie Stover met me in my office in the afternoon.  We discussed their case involving their 10-year-old son William.  It was a tragedy.  William had been driving a motorized minibike without a helmet and sustained serious head injuries.  He was taken to the ER and was forced to wait in that holding room for over 12 hours before anyone had evaluated him.  When he was eventually evaluated, it was determined that he needed a specialist to conduct a thorough evaluation, causing another 4-hour delay.  By the time he was seen by a neurological head trauma specialist, at least 17 hours had passed since the accident.  At this time, it was discovered that there was a “brain bleed” that needed “immediate” attention.  The hemorrhaging was stopped, but not before there was irreversible damage caused by the “brain bleed.”

Damages in the Stover Case

Years later, William needed 24-hour care, and was unable to talk, walk, or move on his own.  He could not feed himself and was unable to drink on his own.  In fact, William was now confined to a wheelchair, but could not move it on his own and needed someone to move him from place to place.  While he was conscious, he was unable to communicate in any manner.  He could not go to the restroom on his own and was unable to let anyone know when he needed to go, resulting in having to always wear diapers.  Based on the medical records and reports provided by Mr. and Mrs. Stover, he would need continual care for the rest of his life, and there was little to no hope of improvement in William’s condition.

Signed Up: Urgent Action Needed on the Stover Case

The task at hand was daunting.  I needed to find an expert medical malpractice accident attorney to take the lead on the case, and quickly start working.  I knew that many experts would be required from emergency room doctors, to neurologists, to head injury specialists.  Experts on emergency room protocols and procedures would be required and experts on damages would be essential to establish the cost of continual care for the rest of William’s life, his loss income, and future medical expenses.  This was way out of my league.  I consulted with Jack on the case, and he was very excited about the prospects.  He knew a great lawyer with medical malpractice experience at one of the top plaintiff’s firms in Houston, Fizer, Galbraith, and Leads.  He said he had known Mr. Reynold Arrington for years and would review the case with him.  I signed the case up for a 40% attorneys fee, of which I kept 10% of total attorney’s fee personally, leaving 30% to be divided among the additional lawyers.  I then referred the case to Jack to negotiate with Mr. Arrington on behalf of the Stover’s.  After a week of negotiations, Mr. Arrington took the case, and Jack and he entered as attorneys of record in the Stover matter.  I do not know the fee agreement between Jack and Mr. Arrington, but only that I personally retained 10% of any settlement or judgment as my portion of the attorney fees.

Same Lifestyle, Same Results

For Jack, the Stover case would consume most of his efforts for the next 11 months until it was tried in late March 1996.  For me, my professional and personal life was much like it was when I was practicing under the banner of Helixon & Wolverton.  I would get new cases from my advertising, referrals from Mr. Broussard and Mr. McNair, and working court appointments.  The remainder of my cases would come from direct referrals from hanging out at the Pig & Whistle when Kendall would work the night shift at the hospital.  I was living a double life – one way when Kendall was working, and another way when she was off.  While I was concerned those two lives would collide, they never did, in large part because those who knew me as the Pig & Whistle lawyer never mentioned anything to Kendall, even though some knew her.  I continued to drink every night Kendall was working to the point of blacking out and would smoke marijuana virtually every day.  Kevin and I rarely saw each other when I was working with Jack, but on occasions we would catch up.  We then lived in separate worlds, with separate friends, and separate responsibilities.  I was making enough money through my criminal practice, and personal injury and family law referrals from my advertising, to make sure the doors at Helixon & Helm stayed open – Jack still had residual clients he managed outside of the Stover case, and things were going well.  Over the course of the next year, I would try several cases including a rape case, a distribution of over 100 kilos of cocaine case, a child abuse case, and a couple of DUI cases.

Close Encounters with DUIs

With me closing down the Pig & Whistle three to four nights a week, or whatever bar I wound up at, I was not careful about my driving after I had been drinking.  I still met with Mr. Broussard and the judges many days a week drinking, and I began to think I was bulletproof.  I was even stopped on three separate occasions for suspicion of DUI, and each time I managed to either talk my way out of it or pass the field sobriety tests.  This in turn led to even more risk-taking behaviors as my drinking started to get out of control, at least when Kendall was working.  Since all the bars in Houston close at 0200, even when I left at closing time, I would get a solid 5-6 hours of sleep and be ready to go most mornings, especially if I eased into it by getting high.  In retrospect, this is the time when my drinking first got out of hand, even though when I did not drink, I would not suffer from withdraw symptoms and I rarely had a hangover. I did not realize it at the time, but this was the writing on the wall for my addiction to alcohol.

Life Changing Case Results: Hopeful of a Settlement

 The cycle of trying cases, making plea agreements, chasing clients who owed me money, and signing new cases, was a familiar routine and carried into the new year and the following spring – so did the drinking and smoking marijuana.  We were excited at the firm because the Stover case was finally going to trial.  Both Jack and I were hopeful of a nice settlement on the eve of trial, or if it went to trial – a substantial verdict.  This was the big break we were looking for – and a potential end to the daily grind of chasing the daily dollar.  Things were not bad at the firm in late March 1996, as we had close to $75,000 in our operating account to carry us for the next couple of months.  Hitting on the Stover case would be everything we could ask for, even though we knew any verdict and financial award would be appealed, either setting up a post-trial settlement or years of additional appellate litigation.  Our damages expert put the total lifelong damages at over $50 million dollars, while the defense expert assessed the damages at closer to $10-20 million dollars. Any way you sliced it, it looked like I was going to get a payday of at least $1,000,000 or up.  To say I was excited was an absolute understatement.

Stover Case Goes to Trial

The Stover case did not settle before the trial, and Mr. Arrington and Jack, along with a local counsel, began the trial in late March – I got daily trial updates, and by all accounts, things were going great.  One April day, I was visiting my dad and brother in Fort Worth, and that day I got a call from Jack – the Stover case was with the jury, and they were deliberating.  I was nervously anxious about the outcome.  I was not much of good company with my mind completely on the Stover case.

Waiting on the Stover Verdict

The next day I went golfing with my brother Doug. We were at the Pecan Valley Golf Club in Fort Worth, Texas.  I was completely consumed with the potential outcome of the Stover case but thought a round of golf would take it off my mind for a bit.  I remember it like it was yesterday, we had just finished the front nine, had gone to the clubhouse to get a snack and a drink, and had made our way to the 10th tee box waiting to start the back nine.  The phone rang and it was Jack – the jury was back and announcing their decision.  We lost.  In Staten Island where the case was tried, for a civil verdict the decision had to be 10-2 for a finding of liability; the jury found liability in the Stover case by a finding of 9-3, resulting in a “no liability” finding.  The case was over.  My dreams of being a millionaire were dashed by a single juror!  I could not believe it, that a single juror, one person, could so drastically alter my future.  I don’t recall finishing the round of golf, but I am sure I was high, drunk, or both.  I stayed in the Fort Worth area visiting my dad and brother for a couple of days before driving back to Houston to carry on with the practice – and chasing the dollar daily.

Forced to Make Changes: Returning to Houston

Of course, I called Kendall and let her know what was going on.  She was positive and upbeat, saying that it was never a sure thing, and that she did not count on that money.  She reassured me that I would get back on the horse and keep working like I had been before the Stover verdict. She was right of course, I was still young in the practice of law, and I could just keep getting referrals, getting cases from the ads, and chasing the court appointments.  Nothing really changed except there was no big payday. I just needed to go back home to Houston.

Shock at the Bank: Account was Liquidated

I drove back to Houston looking forward to spending some time with Kendall and decompressing before getting back into the swing of things.  I arrived in Houston in the early afternoon and decided to go to the bank to withdraw $1,000 to spend the weekend with Kendall, and maybe go to Galveston before jumping back into the swing of things on Monday.  It was a Friday afternoon, and I was looking forward to a relaxing weekend and putting the Stover verdict out of my mind and getting refreshed to attack the week ahead.  When I attempted to withdraw the $1,000, the bank teller told me there was not enough money in the account for the withdrawal.  I thought to myself that was impossible – there should have been $75,000 in the account, certainly enough for a $1,000 withdrawal.  I asked the teller what the account balance was, and she told me it was under $100 dollars.  I asked her to check again, and she did, confirming the balance.  She said that there was a withdrawal the previous day of several thousands of dollars, taking the account to less than $100 dollars.  I could not believe it – the only other person with access to the account was Jack, and he must of taken the money out of the account.

Confrontation with Jack About Stealing Money

I called Jack immediately and asked about the withdrawal.  He was very matter of fact about it, and said he withdrew he money the day before because he was several months behind on his mortgage and needed to pay it to prevent foreclosure of his house. He said that he had other bills and expenses to pay that he had neglected, and that money was the only money he had access to – he said that he had decided to close his office.  He said that he had informed the office management company that he would be moving out at the end of the month, and that I needed to vacate the office before then.  He told me that he had let go of our receptionist, and that the part-time paralegal was also let go.  He said that he would arrange for the furniture to be removed from the office next week, and that I should remove all my personal belongings before then.  It finally sank in what Jack was telling me, and I said that most of that money belonged to me – it was my money and I needed it to keep my practice going.  He said that he was sorry, but it was spent or about to be spent, and that he would be filing bankruptcy soon and would list me as a creditor for the money he took.  I stood there in disbelief – what was happening? That account was my only source of money, and without it I could not pay my bills – the Yellow Page advertising, my personal expenses like my car and apartment, or even pay my credit card bills.  Hell, I could not even pay my $400 a month child support at the time.  I was frozen completely out of cash, with no money whatsoever – less than $100.  When I started asking how he could do that and put me in such a bind – he responded very nonchalantly. He said he was in his mid-fifties, and that he did not have any other options.  He told me that I was in my early 30s, and I had a full life and legal practice in front of me, and that I would be able to easily rebound from this set back.  I just stood there in astonishment, trying to process what I had just been told, and what I had just learned.  I ended the call by asking Jack if he was going to redeposit any of the money, he had taken the day before.  Jack said no, and he was sorry, but he had no choice.  I wished him good luck and hung up the phone.  That was the last conversation I ever had with Jack, on the phone or in person, before he died on July 17, 2003, at the age of 64. I never saw a penny of that money again, and I never received notice of a creditor in any subsequent bankruptcy.

Confusion and Despair: What to Do?

I was in a bad spot, and frankly had no idea what to do.  I got my personal items out of the office and left my key in the office.  I had gone from a hopeful millionaire the week before to a destitute criminal defense lawyer with no office, phone, staff, bank account or real means to practice law.  I did not see any way out – where would I go?  What would I do? I told Kendall, and she was shocked. Even her optimism had been dimmed.  I called my brother Doug and told him what had happened.  During the conversation I rhetorically asked him why I don’t just kill myself.  This prompted him to say he was coming to town, and he would see me soon.

Doug’s Visit to Houston and his Army Vision

I don’t remember much of the next few days – I was constantly drunk and high.  Doug made it to town, and I remember golfing with him.  At some point during his visit, he asked me if I still had student loans.  I told him I had over a hundred thousand dollars in student loans, and he said if I joined the Army, they would pay some or all my student loans off.  I just recall starting to laugh at him.  Me? In the Army? I was the last person in the world who anybody could see in the Army.  I was out of shape, overweight, and did not have the outstanding character one generally thinks of when thinking of officers in the Army.  Doug said that to get the student loans I would need to enlist in the Army.  I did not know the real difference between being an officer or enlisted soldier in the Army, I just knew it was not for me.  I then recall Kendall getting into the conversation.  She too was supportive of me joining the Army.  She said that they would provide housing and health insurance, and if Doug was right about the student loans, that would be a great way to reset what had just happened to me.  I reluctantly agreed to talk to a recruiter.

Meeting with the Army Recruiter

The next day, Doug drove me to a recruiting station near Kendall’s parents’ house.  I think we were going to have dinner there, or otherwise meet with them later that day.  We walked in the recruiting station near a shopping mall and were met by MSG Barton Wheaton.  Doug did most of the talking, being the natural salesperson that he is.  MSG Wheaton talked about the student loan repayment program that would pay $55,000 of my student loans off over the course of three years and talked about my pay and promotion opportunities as an enlisted soldier with a college degree.  MSG Wheaton my potential job would depend on how I scored on the Armed Services Vocational Aptitude Battery (ASVAB) test, and once I had a score, he could go over the potential jobs with me. He said as a lawyer, I should score well on the test, and probably any job the Army offered should be open to me, including being a paralegal working in JAG.  He said I could serve as a paralegal for a few years, and then apply as a JAG Officer, and with my experience as a paralegal, I should be a guaranteed selection to a JAG Officer.  MSG Wheaton said there was a test the following day at the Military Entrance Processing Station (MEPS) in downtown Houston, and he could get me in for the test.  I was interested.

Delay of the ASVAB and Drug Screen

I agreed to go take the ASVAB the next day and MSG Wheaton said I would also be drug tested at that time.  I told MSG Wheaton that I would need to “study” for the drug test, and that I could not take one tomorrow.  He asked me how long I would need before taking the drug test, to which I asked him how long it would take to have marijuana clear my system as a daily smoker for the last couple of years.  MSG Wheaton said he would set me up to take the ASVAB in about three weeks, and we would go from there.  I wound up signing various enlistment documents that night, including a Delayed Entry Document that would postpone my date of entry into the Army until mid-August, thereby giving me time to lose weight and physically prepare to go to basic training.  I could not believe I just signed up for the Army.  MSG Wheaton told me that if I was ever asked about smoking marijuana, that I should say that I only occasionally tried it on a couple of occasions, and never admit to smoking it regularly or daily.  I left the recruiting station with the intent to enlist in the Army and I needed to clear my system of all marijuana over the course of the next three weeks.

Starting the Cleansing Process

I told Kendall about joining the Army and she was very happy.  She thought it was the best decision I could have made at the time, and she was very supportive of the decision.  The next day I talked to my neighbor in the duplex I was living in, asking him how to clear my system of marijuana as fast as I could.  He was a medical doctor in his residency.  He told me that he would prescribe me a diuretic that would flush my system quicker, but I would need to eat bananas and drink Gatorade to stay hydrated and with sufficient potassium.  Doug left the next day, and I went about the business of getting ready to join the Army.

Enlisting in the U.S. Army Delayed Entry Program

I kept in constant contact with MSG Wheaton who was monitoring my progress for the ASVAB and drug test.  I had quit smoking marijuana and I was taking the diuretic and drinking my Gatorade and eating bananas.  I asked MSG Wheaton if there were PT classes that were organized by the recruiting station for people preparing to ship out, to which he said no but he would investigate starting one.  Within a week, MSG Wheaton had started a PT session that met twice a week for delayed entry enlistees run by recruiters.  I made every session and rode my bicycle daily to lose weight.  I took the ASVAB and passed the drug test. MSG Wheaton had me come back into the office to sign some more paperwork, assigning me a job, in this case a paralegal, and designating me for basic training.  He also set my date to ship out to basic training as August 16, 1996.  I would keep in constant contact with MSG Wheaton until the day I shipped to basic training.

Winding Down and Preparing to Ship Out

I continued to work out and lose weight, dropping from 275 pounds to 245 pounds when I ultimately shipped out of the MEPS on August 16, 1996.  I also continued to work on some court appointments to have some spending money as I prepared to join the Army.  My credit was shot since I could not pay my business-related bills, especially the Yellow Page ad.  I decided for the bank to pick up my car, and terminated my lease, and insurance.  I told all my friends and mentors I was enlisting in the Army, and to a person they were all opposed to the idea.  Only Doug and Kendall were supportive of me joining the Army.  The decision was made, and all that needed to happen was for August 16, 1996, to arrive.

I’m in the Army Now: Reporting to Army MEPS and Shipping Out to Basic Training

August 16, 1996, finally arrived.  Kendall dropped me off at the MEPS and we said our goodbyes.  It would be a long few months with me in training, and we did not know for certain when we would see each other again, much less know where would wind up living after my training.  She was a trooper and was totally supportive of going anywhere the Army sent me despite living in Houston her entire life and leaving her family to start the Army life with me.  I spent the entire day doing last minute paperwork, getting orders, and taking the oath of enlistment.  I was taken to the airport and dropped off to catch a flight to St. Louis.  I was spending my basic training at Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri.  After I arrived in St. Louis, I waited for a bus with other enlistees, and after about an hour the bus arrived.  We were herded on the bus but were treated like regular people not a bunch of Army recruits.  I am not sure how long the bus ride was to Fort Leonard Wood, but when we arrived, we were hurried off the bus and forced to stand in lines painted on the pavement – soldiers were yelling at us, and barking commands.  As I stood there, the thought entered my mind – what the hell had I done?  This was the first day of my 26-year Army career.

United States Army (Various Locations)

Basic Training, Fort Leonard Wood, Missouri (August 1996 – October 1996)

Arrival at Reception Battalion and Waiting to Start

After the initial arrival at the reception battalion where everyone was screamed at getting off the buses, things calmed down.  The soldiers running the reception were firm, but not bombastic – I started to think this was not such a bad experience.  I did find myself sitting around thinking how I could have wound up in the Army. What went so wrong in my life that at 31 years old, I was surrounded by 18-year-old kids directly out of high school in Army Basic Training?  I recall spending about a week at the reception battalion and was told by a NCO working there that the Basic Training Classes were on a schedule, and how long we would be there at reception depended on the training schedule of the unit to which we were going to be assigned.  It made sense.  It was not a rolling introduction to Basic Training, and we would be sent down to the training area in groups, ready to start our Army training.  We were repeatedly implored to enjoy our time at reception because life would change drastically at the training unit.  At reception, I got my first Army haircut, was issued all my Army equipment and uniforms, got a litany of shots, received a medical examination, and spent countless hours “hurrying up to wait.”  By the end of my stay at the reception battalion, I had a duffle bag stuffed with Army gear and uniforms, which would be needed at the training unit.  It was not long before my number was up, and it was time to head down to the training unit to start my Basic Training.

Transfer from Reception to Basic Training Barracks

I am not sure how I thought I would get from the reception battalion to the training barracks.  Buses made the most logical sense in my head – but that was not the case.  When it was time to be transported to the training unit, we were loaded like sardines in “cattle cars,” and driven to the training units.  The “cattle car” was a tractor trailer that was pulled by a semi-rig.  The “cattle car” did not have seats inside, but had bars on the sides and in the middle to hold on to.  When we were all jammed into the “cattle car,” the doors were closed, and there were very few windows – you became disoriented, not knowing where you were going.  I remember it seemed like it took a half an hour to get to the training area – maybe the driver was driving us around so we would not have any idea where we were when we were dropped off.  Standing there with my duffle bags between my knees in front of me, the “cattle car” finally came to a stop.  I was full of anticipation at to what would happen next: the doors flew open and drill sergeants greeted the “cattle car” by screaming at the trainees to get off their truck and get in formation – this was like you imagined from decades prior – complete chaos with trainees running around trying to find where to go, carrying their duffle bags like their prized possessions.  Ultimately, I found my place to the formation, stood in line directly behind the person in front of me, and waited for instructions.  There were still trainees running around like chickens with their head’s cutoff, some of which were in tears and scared to death.

Basic Training Barracks

After the initial shock of arriving at the training barracks wore off, and the mood settled down, we were introduced to our drill sergeants.  For my platoon it was drill sergeant (SSG) Cory Templeton and drill sergeant (SFC) Ryan Musgrave.  These two soldiers would for the next two months be the only real connection we had to the outside world.  We spent the next couple of hours inventorying all the contents of our duffle bags, with mandatory running around the barracks when soldiers could not find the item being sought at the time.  I think I must have run around the barracks building 25 times before the inventory was over.  My basic training class was a co-ed class, and there were a group of females just sobbing in our formation.  The drill sergeants seemed to get energized by the fear and discomfort of the trainees, and by the time our inventory was complete – several trainees had broken down completely – and this was only day zero of training.

I don’t recall eating that day, although I am sure we did.  In the Army training environment, meals were never missed.  We had a meeting with all the trainees of the platoon and the drill sergeants to select the platoon guide – the trainee that would be the “student leader” of the group. The drill sergeants emphasized the point that there would be several platoon guides during the duration of the basic training because they would constantly be fired for not following the rules, or violating some unwritten custom.  The way my drill sergeant picked the first platoon guide was by age – the oldest member of the platoon would be the first platoon guide.  As it turned out, I was at least 6 years older than the closest other trainee who was 25 years old.  On day zero, I was selected as the platoon guide.  I was taken into the office and briefed on the duties of the platoon guide – basically, to keep the platoon organized, and to encourage the trainees to get to the right location at the right time.  It seemed easy enough.  It was during this briefing that my drill sergeants discovered that I was a lawyer and had practiced for three years before enlisting in the Army.  They would later use that information to their advantage.

Platoon Guide: Learning I was a Lawyer

When the drill sergeants learned I was a lawyer, they were very surprised.  One asked me if I was disbarred or banned from practicing law.  I found the question amusing, but insisted I was licensed to practice law in Texas.  After about a week of training with no miscues as the platoon guide, the drill sergeants called me into the office, closed the door, and had a normal conversation with me – like I was a person.  They told me that when we changed to the next phase, I would be given more autonomy over the soldiers in the platoon and would march them to and from chow on my own.  They also told me that since I was an adult, they were going to let me supervise what happened in the evenings, and they would spend more time with their families – they gave me their home telephone numbers, and said when we change phases, if they were not around and something happened, to call them at their houses.  Other than this conversation and additional responsibilities, I was treated like everyone else – except I was really challenged physically.

Physical Demands and Mental Games

I remember the early morning runs, and the late afternoon road marches the most.  The PT was not terrible since there were so many trainees, it was hard to have a drill sergeant in your face the entire time during PT.  Pushups, sit-ups, and other calisthenics, followed by the infamous runs.  I hated running, and it showed – I also was not very good at it.  For me, running was the biggest difficulty at basic training.  The rest was pretty easy.  Classes, marksmanship, the field problem, land navigation, and basic drill and ceremony were a breeze compared to the running.  The mental games of mass punishment and exercise for individuals making mistakes was no problem.  For me, I found basic training to be a mental vacation from the rigors of practicing law and trying to run a business.  I did not have to think about anything.  I was told what to do, when to do it, and for how long to do it.  My brain was on vacation, and I was enjoying that aspect of basic training.  What I did not enjoy was the absolute inability of 18-year-old girls to not talk in formation.  No matter how much trouble we got into as a group, and how often it occurred (daily), they found it impossible to stand in a formation without talking to each other.  It simply amazed me.  How hard was it to stand in a formation without talking?  Apparently, it was too tall of an order, and like clockwork, we were called to “half right face,” “front leaning rest position,” “push.”  It was a daily event, and despite the consequences, the next day, the same kids would be talking in the formation.  It drove me crazy.

Graduation from Basic Training

I managed to stay the platoon guide for the duration of the basic training cycle – in part because it was easy, and in part because the drill sergeants wanted another adult to help manage the kids.  Upon completion of the training, we had a graduation ceremony and were given a day off to spend with loved ones who came to graduation.  For me, Kendall came to my basic training graduation, and we got to spend some time together after basic training and before I shipped out to AIT.  This was the first time I saw her since leaving the MEPS on August 16, 1996.  We would not find out where we would be moving until about half way through the AIT in South Carolina.

Advanced Individual Training, Fort Jackson, South Carolina (October 1996 – December 1996)

I remember that soldiers were being shipped all over the country for various AIT schools.  I was heading to Fort Jackson to Alpha Company, 3-69 where all paralegals and administrative assistance did their advanced training.  I was given a set of orders, loaded a bus, and headed out to South Carolina from Missouri.

Arrival at AIT at Fort Jackson

I remember arriving at Fort Jackson and being in-processed through the company.  I also remember that the attitude at AIT was much more relaxed than it was at basic training.  We waited a few days for soldiers from different areas to arrive to join our AIT class.  When we all arrived, we were called together as a group, and briefed on how AIT would be run.  We would do PT in the morning, attend classes during the day, and do any additional training in the evening.  The pace was much slower that at basic training, and we had many more liberties than we had at Fort Leonard Wood.

Application to JAG Corps as Officer

When I was at Fort Leonard Wood, I met with a JAG Corp field screening officer to apply to the JAG Corps as an officer.  It was one of my drill sergeant’s ideas.  SFC Musgrave pulled me aside one day and said that being an enlisted paralegal would drive me crazy and recommended me applying to be an officer.  I completed the officer application at AIT, and after consideration by the accession board, I was not selected to be an officer in the JAG Corps.  I would later find out, that I would have to get out of my enlisted contract to join the JAG Corps as an officer, and to be eligible for the appropriate chapter to accept a commission in the U.S. Army I would have to complete at least half of my enlisted contract.  I simply was not eligible to become an officer until I had more enlisted service under my belt.

Learning to be a Paralegal

The paralegal classes were interesting.  I was learning the basics of military justice and administrative separations.  I felt like I was in “law school light,” as the teaching methods were direct, and provided us the answers.  We spent some of each day learning how to type – for me, I already was good with the keyboard, so the typing requirement was a breeze.  I really looked forward to my classes, learning the U.C.M.J. and various legal regulations frequently encountered by paralegals.  I could see how knowing the information taught to the paralegals would greatly assist me as an officer, if I were to ever get accepted into the JAG Corps as an attorney.

Being a Kid Again

At AIT, after a few weeks, we were given overnight passes.  The pass would start on a Saturday afternoon and would end on a Sunday mid-morning.  Typically, the paralegals going out on pass would pool their resources and rent a couple of hotel rooms, buy a bunch of beer and liquor, and sit in the room and drink, after going out to dinner.  Of course, the young paralegals could not participate in the drinking because of the drinking age, but from what I could tell, everyone on a pass participated in these paralegal parties at the local hotel.  I recall hanging out with the paralegals on a couple of passes, and I really enjoyed being a “kid” again.  This was a far cry from chasing the dollars as a criminal defense lawyer in Houston – now I just did what I was told, showed up at the right place, in the right uniform, and I got paid – although not very much.  Much like basic training, AIT was a mental vacation just with a lot less stress.

Getting Married in North Carolina

By late October, I had received my orders sending me to Fort Knox, Kentucky.  I had never been to Kentucky before in my life, and soon I would be living there.  I discovered that if you were not married, the Army would not move your fiancée to your duty station.  I also learned that you had to be married while at AIT for the Army to move you and your spouse to your new duty station based on the orders received at AIT.  This was a problem for Kendall and me.  We were scheduled to get married in late December 1996, after I would have graduated and left AIT.  As a result, the Army would not move Kendall or any of her belongings to Fort Knox, Kentucky.  Additionally, we would not be eligible for on base married couple housing at Fort Knox until we were married, and the December wedding date was causing us problems to get qualified for family housing at Fort Knox.  Kendall and I decided to take a weekend pass in November, and drive to North Carolina and get married before I finished AIT.  This would solve all of the moving and housing issues surrounding our December wedding in Houston.  So the week after hanging out with the paralegals on pass at the local hotel, Kendall and I drove to Dalton, North Carolina, and were issued a marriage certificate, and got married the same day (there is no waiting requirement for marriages in North Carolina).  We did not tell a soul what we had done, but for the purposes of Army bureaucracy, we were now officially married a month before I completed AIT.

Graduation from AIT

I don’t recall the actual graduation from AIT, but I do recall being excited about finishing the course and being qualified as a paralegal.  I looked forward to arriving in Fort Knox, ready to bring my legal and paralegal skills to the table.  While I was at AIT, I met two other lawyers who were going through the AIT program for the exact same reason I was: the student loan repayment program.  The Army would later change the program and offer loan repayments for officers entering the JAG Corps, but that change was still years away.  Upon completing the Advance Individual Training course, the Army put me on a bus, and sent me back to Houston from where I enlisted.

Return to Houston for Marriage and Move to Fort Knox.

With my report date sometime in early January 1997 to Fort Knox, I spent the “exodus” or break in training in Houston preparing for the move to Fort Knox. Kendall and I would be moving to Fort Knox together after the December wedding.  She had already been scouting places for her to work as a labor and delivery nurse when we moved to Fort Knox, and the closest place was in Louisville, about a 45-minute drive from the base.  We got married on December 28, 1996, in front of the family, and were on the road to Fort Knox soon thereafter.  I remember Kendall driving her car up to Kentucky after I arrived, and it was broken into where she spent the night during the drive up.  When she arrived, we were quickly moved into Van Voorhies family housing and we soon took our furniture and made the transition from civilian life in Houston, to a military life at Fort Knox, Kentucky.

Fort Knox, Kentucky (January 1997 – July 1998)

Arrival to Fort Knox and Integration into the Office

Kendall and I arrived in Kentucky in January 1997, and I started my first job in the Army as a paralegal specialist with the rank of E-4 (Specialist).  My sponsor was a staff sergeant, SSG Missy Kendrick, who helped Kendall and me adjust to the Army.  SSG Kendrick was a graduate of Cornell University with a veterinary degree.  She joined and stayed in the Army because she followed her husband into the service.  Having graduated from an Ivy League University, she understood the unique feelings associated with being “over-educated” for the duty position she currently occupied.  SSG Kendrick made us feel welcomed to the Army, and the Fort Knox legal office specifically.  The chief paralegal was MSG Josh Ballard who was also fantastic in helping Kendall and I transition from civilian to military lifestyles.

The Specialist E-4 Lawyer: How Should I be Treated?

I was first assigned to the miliary justice post-trial section before being sent to the 1st Armor Training Brigade as the NCO paralegal processing medical discharges for injured basic training soldiers.  There were two prosecutors, and the way they treated me was as stark as night and day.  CPT Phelan Michaels was fantastic and treated me like a seasoned litigator who had tried more cases than he had – we talked about trial strategy, case development and case preparation.  While I was not permitted to work on actual cases CPT Michaels recognized that I was more than the paralegal specialist wearing E-4 Specialist rank.  On the other hand, the other prosecutor, CPT Mark Tower could not see past my rank.  He used me to make copies, pick-up documents from other offices, and prepare files.  Not once did he ask my thoughts on a single case, or legal issue, despite his knowledge that I had tried more jury trials than he had.  I soon learned that how I would be treated depended on the individual – and some would even treat me with contempt – making comments like “have the SPC-lawyer take out the trash,” or “maybe the SPC-lawyer can cut the grass today.”  All-in-all, Kendall and I were welcomed to Fort Knox and the U.S. Army with enthusiasm and respect.

Working as a Military Paralegal

I enjoyed working as a paralegal, as it did not require much thought.  Most of the tasks were “by the numbers” and repetitive in nature.  There was no legal analysis or legal strategy employed by young paralegals.  I typed documents for filing and submission, none of which required thought.  It was usually a matter of taking a previous example of the document prepared in a previous case and changing the names and case numbers.  Rote, repetition, application of written procedures – I was enjoying my mental vacation and took full advantage of not exercising my brain regularly.  The problem was that I was having $750 a month taken out of my check for child support and insurance for Lauren.  My pay at the time was only $1,113.60 a month for an E-4 with less than two years of service.  After deducting the child support and insurance, my monthly pay was only $363.60 a month, or $181.80 per pay period before taxes were taken out.  I was basically working for government housing, and the remainder of the responsibility for our family earnings fell on Kendall and her job as a nurse in Louisville.

Part-time Job as Civilian Paralegal/Lawyer

After a couple of months, I looked for a part-time job after the duty day and on the weekends.  It was just a matter of “simple addition” that I needed more than $181 dollars every two weeks to contribute to the household expenses.  I got permission from the chief paralegal, MSG Ballard, to find a part-time job, and after about a week of looking, I found a job as a part-time lawyer at the Law Office of Moses Hardone in Elizabethtown, Kentucky, about 30 minutes (15 miles) south of Fort Knox.  At the time, I was getting paid $18 an hour, and working up to 20 hours a week, supplementing our income up to $1,500 a month working for Mr. Hardone.  The only negative aspect of working for Mr. Hardone was I had to use my lawyer’s mind and my vacation time was over when working for him.

Kendall’s Support of Life at Fort Knox

The lifeblood of the income to the family was the salary that Kendall received from working as a labor and delivery nurse in a major hospital in Louisville, Kentucky.  She was again working the night shift, and on the days that she worked, she would leave about the time I was getting home for the day.  This did not allow much time for us to grow as a couple, and again left me alone 3-4 days a week, only now I had no money to go out and close local bars.  Since I had quit smoking pot, I started drinking beer, and I would have 2-4 beers a day during the week as I started to replace marijuana with alcohol – a trend that continued throughout my military career.  In addition to her work schedule, Kendall was able to fully integrate into the JAG spouses and supporters’ network, and fully represent our young family.  Without the dedication, support, and hard-work of Kendall, I would not have been able to support myself as an enlisted soldier in the U.S. Army – and she made my long-term military career possible with her early sacrifices to our cause.

Family and Social Life at Fort Knox

Transitioning from a broad social life in Houston involving professionals like lawyers, doctors, and nurses, to the military enlisted social life is quite a major transition.  Whereas our circle of friends in Houston usually involved people with advanced degrees and years of education, the enlisted circle that I was required to socialize with at Fort Knox was generally younger than us and not formally educated.  It was not bad, just different, and it took some adjustment.  When Kendall was not working, we did go out and have a good time.  We went to the Enlisted/NCO club on post several times and would make weekend trips to Louisville to the dance/bar scene there.  This usually happened with a group of friends from base.  We also spent a good amount of time socializing with SSG Missy Kendrick and her family.  On weekends we would also go to SPC Everette Bratton’s quarters and play cards and dominoes with him and his wife Rose, and any guests they had over – and of course without saying, drink.

Notice to Deploy to Honduras (August 1997 – February 1998)

Only a few months into my duty at Fort Knox, I was notified by MSG Ballard that Fort Knox had been tasked to provide a paralegal to Joint Task Force Bravo in Honduras, and I was the only soldier available to deploy.  It was a 6-month deployment, and I would be leaving at the end of July 1997.  This was certainly not something I had contemplated when I decided to enlist in the Army a few months prior.  Kendall and I were just starting to get into a groove, and get adjusted to military life at Fort Knox, and I am suddenly being shipped away to Honduras for 6-months.  We had been married less than 6-months, and the separation was not an ideal situation for our marriage.  It did not matter – I was promoted laterally to Corporal and sent to Honduras in late-July 1997.

Kendall’s Vacation to Honduras

Kendall was able to take some vacation and join me in Honduras for an extended long weekend.  We spent some time in Tegucigalpa and on the Roatan Islands.  It was a great mini vacation in October 1997, and we had an excellent time.  The trip helped make the time in Honduras pass much faster, and it was nice to get to enjoy the local surrounding when I was deployed.

Leave in Texas: Denied Visitation with Lauren

I was also permitted to take leave from Honduras and return to Texas for a week during the Christmas Holidays.  Kendall and I met up in San Antonio to celebrate our first wedding anniversary and to take another mini vacation.  We then drove to Fort Worth to pick up Lauren for a visit as scheduled.  Unfortunately, when we got there Kirsten refused to let me see Lauren, or to take her for a visitation.  Instead, she invited me to “take it to the judge” knowing I was only there for a limited time and could not seek any judicial remedy.  I was infuriated and let Kirsten’s actions ruin the last part of our vacation before I returned to Honduras after the New Year to finish my tour.

Redeployment to Fort Knox (16th Cav) (February 1998 – June 1998)

I redeployed from Honduras in February 1998, still smarting from the Christmas visitation fiasco.  I was determined to make Kirsten let me see Lauren, even if that meant going to court and spending whatever money it took – of course, that was the money Kendall earned, not me.  While I was deployed, my application to the JAG Corps as an officer was accepted, and I was selected for accession as an officer.  My preliminary report date was noted as July 1, 1998.  Knowing I would be going to Charlottesville for the JAG Basic Course at the end of summer, Kendall suggested that I just postpone my fight with Kirsten over Lauren, and just focus on us for a while.  Of course, I was not having any of it – and I was making plans for my custody assault, and what I was going to do.  Kendall pointed out that it was at the expense, figuratively and literally, of our relationship to keep fighting Kirsten.  She told me to just focus on us.  I refused.  She then threw down the gauntlet – and said that I needed to choose between her and fighting Kirsten over Lauren.  I asked her if she was making me choose between her and Lauren, and she looked me dead in the eyes, and said “yes I am.”  I told Kendall not to make me “make a choice between her and Lauren,” and Kendall, without hesitation, said that she is making me make that choice and I needed to choose whether I was going to focus on our relationship, or continue to fight to see Lauren. I puffed my chest out and said that I was going to fight to see Lauren.  The rest is history, as they say.

Kendall Decides to Leave (March 1998)

That day, Kendall called her dad in Houston to fly to Kentucky and help her move her stuff back to Houston.  She told her dad that she would rent a truck, and she needed help driving it and her car back home.  Kendall told me that she wanted a divorce since I wanted to focus on Lauren rather than us, and she would be leaving by week’s end.  Everything was very amicable.  We divided up the music, the household belongings, and decided what furniture we would split.  When her dad arrived in Louisville, we went and picked him up, and the night before Kendall left, the three of us went out to dinner at an Italian restaurant on post.  That night, Kendall and I shared the bed that we had slept in since moving to Fort Knox.  The next morning, after all the things were packed into the moving truck, I stood in the front yard – hugged and kissed her goodbye – and watched her drive away with her dad.  That was the last time I saw Kendall until over 25 years later when we had dinner and caught up on each other’s lives.  She immediately filed for divorce when she returned to Texas, with it finalized on July 29, 1998.

Drinking and Partying Regularly (March 1998 – July 1998)

With Kendall out of the house, there was no check on my behavior – I was freshly single, and available to drink at will.  I brought vodka into the house and drank every night – I never drank in the morning or during work hours, but after being released for the day, I got my drink on.  A good friend of mine at the time quickly became my drinking buddy.  SGT Patrick Harding worked in the same section I did at the 16th Cavalry Regiment and was also going through a divorce – misery loves company.  Patrick and I would wind up drinking every day at the on-post bar.  Many nights we could close it down.  On the weekends, Patrick and I would either go to the NCO club, or drive to Louisville to party there.  This continued non-stop until I would eventually leave for the JAG Officer Basic Course.

I Meet Ms. Finley Hurd in Milwaukee (May 1998)

In May of 1998, I was selected for a temporary duty mission in Milwaukee, Wisconsin.  I was chosen to work with the Milwaukee Recruiting Battalion to go into local high schools and tell my story about my experiences in the Army to motivate high school kids to enlist in the Army.  This mission was for a week and was right up my alley – convincing people to do things, in this case, join the Army.  When I arrived in Milwaukee, the recruiting battalion said they did not need me for a couple of days.  Not surprisingly, I spent those couple of days in the various bars of Milwaukee, Wisconsin.  I was in a bar near downtown, and I ordered a craft beer from the bartender.  The bartender tells me he can’t serve me that beer, only a Miller Brewing Company product. I was confused and asked “why?” He told me that his Miller Rep was sitting at the bar a couple of stools down from me – I looked over there, and there was this woman wearing Miller Brewing Company gear.  She looks at me and says I can order any Miller product in the bar – I start laughing and introduce myself.  She introduces herself as “Finley.”  We spent the next hour or so talking and laughing – until she must leave.  She invites me to an event that night that she will be hosting at another bar, and I agree to meet her there.  I met her that night, and we hit it off – ultimately spending every evening I was in Milwaukee together going out.  I would wind up dating Finley for the next 12 months in a long-distance relationship from Fort Knox, Charlottesville, and Fort Polk, Louisiana.

Promotion and Drive to Charlottesville (July 1998)

When I returned to Fort Knox, I continued to go out nightly with Patrick until I moved to Charlottesville, Virginia to start the JAG Basic Course.  On June 30, 1998, before leaving for Charlottesville, I was promoted by the Staff Judge Advocate at Fort Knox from Corporal (E-4) to First Lieutenant (O-2) based on the orders accessing me into the JAG Corps as an officer.  As I walk outside as a freshly minted Lieutenant, SGT Patrick Harding renders to me my first salute as an officer.  My return to the practice of law lies just around the corner.

Soto Cano Air Base, Honduras

Judge Advocate Basic Course, Charlottesville, Virginia

Fort Polk, Louisiana (Now Fort Johnson)

Taszar Air Base, Hungary

Bamberg, Germany (First Infantry Division)

Hanau, Germany (Trial Defense Services)

Judge Advocate Graduate Course, Charlottesville, Virginia

Vicenza Italy (173rd Airborne Brigade Combat Team)

Jalalabad, Afghanistan (173rd ABCT)

Ballston, Virginia (Defense Counsel Assistance Program)

Grafenwoehr, Germany (Special Victim Prosecutor)

Joint Base Lewis McChord, Washington (I Corps)

VSR Financial Services, Inc., Overland Park, Kansas

7th Legal Operations Detachment, Independence, Missouri (Reserves)

Law Office of Will M. Helixon, Kansas City, Missouri (U.S. Office)

Law Office of Will M. Helixon, Vilseck, Germany (Germany Office)

Getting Sober at Warriors Heart, Bandera, Texas

Concluding Thoughts – Will M. Helixon