The whole team PLUS Mario,the Intern are crammed in the BUNK BED STUDIO for a fun chat with a sweet guy, (BK Kowalski) who wrote a sweet book about a sweet dog, Busco. The lessons learned are in lock step with our goal to give the world a dose of the Minnesota Nice that it desperately needs.
The whole team PLUS Mario,the Intern are crammed in the BUNK BED STUDIO for a fun chat with a sweet guy, (BK Kowalski) who wrote a sweet book about a sweet dog, Busco. The lessons learned are in lock step with our goal to give the world a dose of the Minnesota Nice that it desperately needs.
Welcome to the Kindness Chronicles where we hope to inject the world with a dose of the Minnesota nice that it desperately needs we have a full studio today. It's a big, big show. Big week. Big show. We've got Mr. Gorg is in the, uh, Catbird seat. He's not calling us from the lake like he usually does. Oh, good lord. He's no longer on assignment. Steve Brown here. And then, uh, we have a summer intern. We are so impressed with Mario Esteb. We decided to hire him with, uh, we're paying him in chicken nuggets. Yep. The best guys. Exactly. To help us with some social media. I just want to start by thanking our listeners. We discovered that, uh, in the world, our podcast is in the top ten percent for listenership. We don't know how that happened. Um, we haven't done a ton of promotion around it, but I think, you know. We've had some unbelievable guests, which helps, and people are in the mood for some good news and some kindness rather than the beat down that social media sometimes provides. So our objective, Mr. Esteb, is to, uh, we would like to use social media as a productive tool as opposed to a destructive weapon. How do you like that? Ooh, nice. Answering right there. I wish I stole that from somebody. It's like a greeting card, but only better. we have a, uh, a Minnesotan who, uh, is our guest today. And Steve, why don't you introduce our guest? Our, theme this week is kindness, to animals, kindness with animals. It's an animal theme. It's sort of like Shark Week, but without the sharks. Yeah, it's our version of Shark Week. Um, yes, our, our guest is someone that I have, uh, found. Um, on, on social media, actually on LinkedIn, I noticed he was a Minnesota guy and a familiar name and I just, I really like what he posts. I like what he's about. He feels like he's one of our kind of guy and uh, and he has a book. And so I asked him if he'd be a part of it and he, you know. Reluctantly agree reluctantly said he'd join us. So let me introduce Mr. Robert Kowalski. We can call him Bob. Welcome to the podcast. BK. People call him BK. I'm a big fan of BK, but that's another situation. Welcome to the Kindness Chronicles. Well, thank you. Uh, what an honor. And, uh, seriously, I genuinely, um, appreciate you having me on and you're, you're speaking to the choir in the sense of two things, kindness, kindness, a hundred percent world needs all that we can throw at it. And, and, um, it's really kind of refreshing that, you know, I don't know how else to say it, but to have males, uh, some male leadership. Uh, talking about genteel and kindness and being good to people because my opinion, women have been doing it forever. And, you know, they got the bigger hearts. They carry the heavy load in this world. Let me be clear. I commend, I commend you guys. God bless you for that. Good. All the good work you're doing. We're not exactly the most manly men. Well, I was going to say. You're a son to them. You're a son to them. Well, none of us have a toolbox or know how to fix a fire. I was going to say, let me be clear. We don't, we don't admit to being the kindest people in the world, but we recognize, we're smart enough to recognize that it's important and we've got to highlight people that are. So we're trying, you know. We're learning. Well, I appreciate that. When I do something that raises an eyebrow, I said, the Kindness Chronicles is a do as I say, not as I do kind of a podcast. You've been doing that as a parent for a long time, Johnny. That's exactly right. So, um, BK. We're going to call you BK. Uh, we, we would like to hear about your, where you're from. What's, I know your, uh, your, your name is very familiar to us. Um, tell us of where you're from and how, you know, how you kind of got into writing. That's a good, uh, good question. Number one. Uh, I think Steve was a Hillary boy, right? Yeah. So was I, so is John. And so, so is, so are you all Hill Mary? Yep. Three are the four. Still got God. Country busted. All the sports. So I'm a creep boy and we used to beat Jeff all the time. Oh yeah. My dad's a Creon guy. I was close to going there, but I st I stuck around in Burnsville, but yeah, you gotta love the Raiders of Creon. Right, and then Husky, too. One of you is a Husky. KG and I have worn Huskies. Um, we are Husky. We're very Husky. So we're fans in that regard. But that has to do with the Kowalski's deli, but we won't get into that. I'm sorry, I interrupted. I'm back to see Paul, yeah. Sorry. That's, uh, yes. And to get that, that clarified that my brother Jim started Kowalski Markets, first generation, uh, very successful middle class story. We had seven kids. I'm the middle of the bunch. He was my older brother. And his wife started that with 15, 000 on a prayer and bought the Grand Avenue store. Um, and it's really never looked back. 11 stores later, 40 years later, we're celebrating this year. And it's just a wonderful, successful story that I've been part of in different. So I started out unloading milk in the back room. He didn't get anything. He just worked for it and managing a store. And then, uh, now I'm a real estate broker, uh, uh, in Minnesota license. So I helped him find these locations. Um, and that's kind of, you know, my real life. And I had a very nice compliment by a friend that I respect. He said, you're kind of a. This is, you're a shaman disguised as a business man. She kept more, yeah, I was really kind of, I said, you know, it's pretty appropriate because I did work in the boundary waters as a guide. I've had tremendous interaction with nature, which will be my next book. It's going to be life lessons learned in nature schoolyard. And it's all my interactions, swimming with barracudas, swimming with sharks in the Galapagos Island, wrestle the bear at a sports show. I had a wolf come up to me in the middle of the boundary waters, hit me in Leg in a storm and kind of gave me a little message. I've had a lot of wonderful, true interactions with nature. And that's where my passion comes for animals, which I, you know, I, I don't like people overall. Animals are much better. Yeah. Animals are way better. You know who they are. You know what they're going to do. You can trust them. People, you got no chance. Like, good luck. Let's try to figure this out. He's right. He's right. Well, I, I myself, uh, BK, I, I'm an avid indoorsman, so I'm not, uh, so you're speaking a language I don't understand, but, uh, it sounds like fun. You've never been out in the big woods, huh? Hell no. Is Well, then you guys, that's good. Can you bake? I mean, what do you bring to the table? A good muffin? Very little. What do we got? John's a talker. John knows how to talk. I'm all right in the grill. He's a good talker. I can grab a couple little steaks from, uh, From Kowalski's and flop those on the grill and I got a shot, but uh, baking not my forte. Yeah, we digress. We do a lot of that. Yeah, we digress, but um, well, yeah, the mantle, the animal thing is truly a hundred percent. I live in a nice acre here in the St. Paul area and I have a crow. That I feed every night. He shows up. I've got raccoon, I got past, I got deer, I got coyotes, and I've made friends with all of them. I saw there's, that's, I saw a video. What going on? I saw a video of you with a, was that a coyote? Was that a wolf that came under your, to your lap? Those are wolfs. Those are wolf. Wow. Those wolf puppies. I'm the wolf wi whisperer. Wow. Um, yeah. You know, I've got a thing going with nature. I truly is the, you know, if you want to heal yourself, this is some advice, not too serious, to anybody out there in the world. You go out to nature, you get in the woods, you sit somewhere quiet by yourself, turn the radio off, turn the noise up. And sit there and be where you come from. Be where your soul is, connects, and I'm telling you, it really is good. Now that's my little preach, I'm done preaching. No, that's, that's great. It's a big deal. It definitely ties in with our, uh, our theme of nature and you know, when you're done listening to the podcast, just. You know, stop your car and then go, you know, go out and walk to the woods. Yeah, you don't sound like any other Cretan guy I know, that's for sure. Yeah, right, right, well, yeah. I did more detention than I did in class. I wasn't very well behaved. What year did you graduate? Sixty nine. Sixty nine? Wow, you are an old guy. I mean, uh, handsome, for sure. Yeah, very. Well, yeah, it's a blessing and a curse. So, uh, tell us about how you... Like, how did you get into writing? I know you've, you've had a, a few different books aside from Boss Bosco, which we're gonna talk about. What, how did you, were you a writer in high school? Were you in col in college? Or like, what did you, what did you do to f you know, forward that momentum and, and get that started? Yeah, that's a great question. I, I know I have no formal writing. Uh, you know, uh, more just a hobby, always a hobby, poetry, short stories, um, my whole life and, you know, never did anything more with them than read them to the family or gifts and stuff. But somewhere along the line, uh, I started writing my first novel about 10 years ago, J. C. A Heroine's Journey. It just, it just was, it was a, truly a kind of an inspirational deal where I was driving down the road and I looked over and I saw a van, a minivan. And the woman, uh, and I didn't know at the time, I said that looks like Jesus driving a minivan. That's exactly what hit my head. Now you gotta remember, all of us talking here, 12 years of private Catholic education that I had. Okay? Eight years too many for me. After four years, I kinda get it. I got that. What else? What else is out there? I needed to learn more and have more. And I respect all religions. But anyway, so that started this. Thought about all my Catholic years and the patriarchal and the, you know, just the, uh, I think the unbalancing. I would like to see women more empowered, I'd like to see a woman cope, I'd like to see women more celebrated in the church and all over the world, and becoming that. And that's the gist of that story. I just took that premise and I twisted all those experiences in a lighthearted, fun tale of what is the concept of what if Jesus came back as a woman? In modern society, and how would that look today? And it's kind of like I say, I'm not trying to be preachy or serious. Think of some of those later, you know, uh, the Book of Mormons or something, where they go, you know, they take the socks and it's just the concept of what would that look like? And it's a little town of serenity and her best friend is Maggie Magdalene, all the characters are disguised in there playing their roles, but it's just the good lessons of being a good person that our brilliant leader, Jesus, you know, it's just kind of takes those lessons and modernize. That's it. And God's a white squirrel and it's just a, it's a different twist on the story. And that's that story. It's, uh, it's, you know, it is what it is. It's, uh, I've had no resistance. Everybody's like, no, that's kind of interesting. Women love it. I have one priest say, God, I'd love to take this and teach it at a class, but it's gotta be a guy. And I said, yeah, that's the point. It's okay. Jesus. He's got, you got men and you got women. He said, I'm coming back. Came back as a woman. And the title of the book is spelled J A Y C E E, correct? Right, J C I, Heroin's Journey is the title. So, I am not especially quick on the uptake, but it just dawned on me that J. C. could also be J dot c, like initials Christ. Right? Is that You're catching up, right? Am I the first one that that figured that out? Or was it No, I'm, I was just No, we we're, we're we all want, listen, I think you're, I think you're the second second the whole world listening. Actually, we listened when we went to, went to school, we paid attention. Yeah, no, that's really cool. That's, that is really interesting. I'd like to hear more about that. I'd like to check it out. I wanna hear about bus. Yeah. Yeah. Boosco. Yeah. We're looking at it right now. The book is right in front of us. It looks awesome. Boosco, um, is a whole different animal. So J. C. takes me 10 years to write, labored over it, going, I'm the last guy to be writing this book, really. I'm not a theologian. I didn't even graduate college. I'm not a religious guy in any way, but I just, what, there's a message that I think is, you know, hey, just good for debate. Let's just get out and talk about it. But Boosco, now I sit down and write Boosco in a day, just pours out of my heart. And the backstory, guys, is I was in Busaco, Portugal with my wife and I'm a big, uh, history guy and a Knights Templar, you know, their whole kind of crusade stuff. I love that stuff. So we stayed at a, we stayed at a castle. That was, you know, kind of reportedly from that era, and it had something to do with all of that history. And I met a dog there that was a stray dog in Busaco, Portugal, and I befriended him. I was there for a week, and I had to leave. I couldn't take him home. And, but he was a stray, but he's also kind of well taken care of because of the cat. So I'm sure... You did some whispering with him? He's well fed. He, he, he liked you? I was whispering with him, yes. Cool. And, and so I, the fun karmic part of this, guys, is I named him Busco out of Busaco, okay? No clue that, that, you know, later on, uh, Spanish or Portuguese, uh, you know what that means? No. No, not really. It says Busco means the wanderer or to look for. Oh, wow. That's so cool. You kind of made that up? Oh, the shaman. Wow. I'm like, wow, there's karma. I had no idea when I came to Busco. The wanderer to look for. So cool. And as you know, you read the book. The puppy gets lost in the storm. Yeah. Wanders and trying to find his, you know, a home and some safety. So that was kind of a cool little backstory I enjoyed. Yeah, um, I like the, there was an animation that you had online. A little bit of the animation too. That was really cool. And as a companion to the book. Yeah, where'd you find the illustrator? Yeah, you know, I'm telling you, I get... It sounds corny, but it's very inspirational. I've been lucky that these things come to me. It's like, I think meant to be, I guess, honestly, because I am just a regular small, like you guys sound, you know, sports and the terrible golfer and have the brightest ball in the tree. I don't know why it works, but, um, I just got online and I said, okay, you know, another real truth story here is the Kowalski name is a lot of, uh, Clown power in the metro area, not necessarily up beyond that, but I'm not the owner. My brother started. I don't have any ownership. Everybody's, you know, I go to a car dealership. Oh, Kowalski, bring out the Maserati. Bring the Ford out. I'm not that one. That's, you know, that's my brother. So long story short, I'm getting kind of a budget thing. I'm like, how much can I afford, you know, drawings? It can be very expensive, you know, they go from 50 bucks to 500 to draw it. And I just, I just Googled, uh, illustrators and I vibed out this person at a very fair rate. And she's from Serbia, Lara. And, uh, she just, uh, I sent her my copy and I told her my visions and here's what I see, I'm scared and all that. She just nailed it, didn't she? Yeah, it's not a little book, there's a lot of illustration in it. There's a lot of stuff in it. Yeah, it's beautiful. There's another piece of art. It's beautiful. It was karmic, guys. It was karmic. And the other thing, here's the fun, another little back story. This is how my life goes, part of my life. The crow, remember I told you earlier, I feed the crow every night. Been doing it forever. Well, she paints the crow or puts the crow in the story. I never wrote him in. Oh, you never had never had him in the story. Busco didn't have a crow friend. I just kind of added this crow following him around. And I thought that's one of my favorite creatures was my buddy the crow. So now he's integral to the story. There he is. And yeah, he's going to be in the next book and such, but it's just magical, but magical things like that have happened to me on both my books of just saying, you know, these are nice messages. Cause the basic message message guys of both books is love unconditionally. Don't judge. Kindness. We're all more alike than we're different. We're all just mutts after all, Busco. And same with JC, just a Jesus lesson, just being kind and, you know, considerate and non judgmental, like what, what you guys are doing, which I love that you guys are doing this. I love it. The world loves it because we all want this. We want kindness. We're tired of the hate. We're tired of the separation. You know, we're just tired of this being, you know, shoved all the time out. That's all you ever hear. And so you're bringing some good news, and I'm so appreciative of that from you guys. You know, the message that I got from the book was just the, uh, the idea of the importance of inclusion and it's a coincidence. Today, um, You, you mentioned the Knights Tempur. So I am a, uh, a Catholic, but I'm also a member of the, uh, the Freemasons. So you know, oh, sure. One of our offshoots are the, the Knights Tempur. And, uh, we have this scholarship program that these guys are pretty well aware of. It's called the Selfless Scholar. And the way that the scholarship works is we invite people to nominate a peer and tell their story of kind. And if that story is one of the stories selected, the scholarship is split between the nominator and the nominee. Well, today I was at Maple Grove High School doing a presentation. In fact, we're going to have these gals on an upcoming episode of the Kindness Chronicles. And what really motivated my committee that was reviewing the scholarship nominations was this girl named Adela had created a book club and the whole purpose of the book club wasn't to read books, but it was during, COVID and she saw all these people that were isolated and people that weren't being included with these cliques. So she created this book club and it put together this group of people that were otherwise isolated. And it created this place for them to meet socially. And while the books were still an important piece of it. You know, I, as I was read effect, as I was reading the Bosco book, you know, and it's not a long read, it didn't, it didn't take too long to read. But what I saw in there was just the importance of, uh, you know, the way that all of the other dogs in the dog park accepted Bosco. the inclusion piece of it, and. when I look at this book, I don't know if you're kidding when you said, uh, pitching, uh, a movie during our pre show thing, but there's a movie here. Do you have plans to write a, uh, screenplay? Well, I certainly appreciate that. Yes, I'm adamantly, uh, focused on getting, uh, this, this made into a movie and J. C. both. Um, I, but Busco, yeah, I just think it'd be a great adamant. animated story and, uh, to reach, you know, kids and I read it at, I've donated over 500 books or more to public schools, animal shelters, and I just read it at the Children's Hospital yesterday. And I say that just because that's my goal is to get the message out of just what you said, inclusion, um, like, this is another one of those visions. I was in LA. And I went down to, uh, the, the Skid Row. I just wanted to see, you know, I saw Beverly Hills, and I saw the best of it, and I saw the worst of it. Because I'm a writer. I want to see these things. And, and it just, it just hit me. The dogs, the dogs in Skid Row would look at their owners with love. And they didn't care who they are, or what they had, or where they lived. No different than the Beverly Hills dog looking, you know, with the little diamonds around their neck. It's just, they just love unconditionally. They love without judgment and I said that's the message to Boosko. That's the message the world we all need is love like a dog No judgment, and it's just pure joy. I mean, I think they're angels like so So yeah that you picked up on that. I presume everybody's included. They don't care what big or small what color you are You know the other dogs they all It's just, it's, they're just phenomenal. That's why I love the animals so much. I think, uh, They're so authentic. I think, I think you're absolutely right. I think what's going on here is that you tapped into something, you tapped into a truth. I think walking in the woods, you're listening and you're, you're, you tapped into some kind of truth and that's what, why this This busco, uh, rings true. I think that's also partly why we're doing this because it's, people are, people are reacting to it because it's, there's a truth here that people are understanding and we gotta, we gotta hear it more and we gotta like celebrate it. We try really hard on this podcast to not get political at all, you talk about diversity and inclusion and unfortunately diversity and inclusion has become like triggering, These triggering terms they've become political and it's, I just think it's ridiculous. It shouldn't be. It shouldn't be. I mean, inclusion is, humanity. That's the type of life that we should all be striving for. When I look at this book and I, I, I know our listeners have young kids or young grandkids that they're thinking about. And I, I also think, you know, it's the season of graduation and this would be an awesome gift. for a graduate and I know as John mentioned it's a children's book and it's, it's going to be an easy read, but this is, this is the message that we want our young people going out into quote unquote the real world with. So I guess for our listeners sake, uh, if they want to grab a couple of copies of this and have this for their graduate or a graduation party they're going to or their, their grandkids or their kids, what's the easiest way for our listeners to find Busco? Kowalski's and Oak Park Heights has about 50 of them. in Woodbury. I'll tell all the all 11. All 11 Kalki stores Atco. Wow. Available. Um, and also, uh, obviously Amazon Books and Barnes Noble, you can order online and it'll come in a day or two. So those two, uh, big, big retailers and all the Kalki have them. And, um, thank you for yeah. Asking about that. I. I think it is a, it's a good, simple message and like you guys, humor is a real connector. You know, I don't want to be preachy and nobody, nobody wants guilt and shame. I had enough of that for 12 years of Catholic school for me to, you know, you know, so we want to have some fun, some laughs and people light hearted. Well, that's What both my books are just trying to tell these messages with, you know, power of love and power of, uh, You know, tolerance and try to understand your brother and the Native Americans. I have a real passion for them I was mentored by a gentleman named Bear. He's an elder and that's kind of my first book But anyway, there's like you said about politics There's an old saying where they have a saying the left and the right two wings in the same bird. Yeah Wow Basically, it's all BS is what it is. It really is! You know, in my opinion, both sides. And we're the pawns in this play. And, you know, just love. That's it. Love's the simplest, simplest, simplest answer to this whole thing. And the dogs haven't figured it out and we don't. Yeah. Yeah, the dogs have never not had that. They look at you like you're the greatest thing ever. Can't wait to see it. Yeah, they just jump and they look and they wait and, I don't know, you know, it's not, we over, we make things way more complex than they need to be. I've traveled the world, I've met people all over the world, we're so much more alike. Another great Native leaders said, if you, if you, if you cut me, I bleed red just like you. We're all the same underneath and it's, it's just that wisdom to know that, quit, quit focusing on our. Differences and oh my god, you're this you're that i'm mad. I just it just maddening to me where Why don't we just start to see what our commonalities and love and then take care of our planet in the process? Yep, and here's my here's my one little preachy thing. Oh god. Here we go. We're not gonna get political BK It's not political, it's not You're in the fricking kitchen making pancakes with you and your wife's like, Oh, I don't want blueberries. I want peaches. And you're arguing. And meanwhile the whole house is on fire. No one's looking up. That's kind of how I see the whole and not political, but you know, I worry about how we treat mother earth. I want us to do a little better job and Boosco is going to write about Boosco goes and meets a whale and he meets all the It meets all the ocean creatures and the whale says, Hey, Blue Squad dove 2, 000 feet and there's trash down there. Can you tell your human friends to do a little better job? It's gonna be like messages like that with love, not crazy preaching, but you know, telling the story through the animals about how we should treat nature a little better because it's our home. Well, in the spirit of trying to sell some of these books, to Kevin's point, you know, these would be... creative, graduation gifts and here's why. our guest from last week, uh, Mario Esteb, who is with us, I mentioned chicken nugget, uh, intern. Mario, one of the things that we talked about last week was just the importance of being inclusive. When you're a freshman in college and everybody is going away to college, they're all sort of in the same boat unless they have, like, built in friends that go to the same school. You probably understand the importance of doing something like this, and as you're a, as you're a student going off to college, it's a really important lesson. Even though it's a kid's book, is it, does it, can you relate? No, yeah, a hundred percent. I think this is for all ages. I mean, like I said last time, everyone's in the same boat, and you just need one person to come up to you and just do a little thing. It starts like a domino effect where if one person does something nice then everyone will and you just need to notice that. And that's with Busco. It's all about Busco. Well said. I love it. Well, well said. Yeah, Busco crosses cultures. I was in, I was in Mexico at a high end resort and the daughter, the owner, this true story, the owner of the resort, Daughter, I gave her a boost because she started crying the next day and hugged me and said it's the best book I ever read. Wow. It, It's a tale that is a human tale. It's all of our story. We all get lost, we all get scared, we all get lonely, and we all just want to be seen and loved. And the dog angels get involved, and Maggie and Bruce go find each other. It's kind of a human story. I mean, you think about your own life. We're all just trying to figure it out, and we should be propping each other up, and trying to help each other on our journeys, and that's it. Not worry about all the other side stuff. Well, it seems like you have a better travel, schedule than, uh, than we do. Portugal, Mexico. Sounds like you got to get out of the house a little bit. Seriously. I was in Hudson a couple of weeks ago. That was beautiful. It's time to go to Gainesville tomorrow. There you go. Did you roll the window down, I mean, or do you keep it rolled out? Oh, we keep them rolled out. Hey, this has been great. Thank you so much, Bob, for sharing this with us. Everybody check out Robert J. Kowalski's Busco, uh, at all Kowalski stores and Amazon and all the stores you find books. Go get them for your kids and your grandkids and your college graduates. Great grads. High school graduates. Great idea. Thank you so much for sharing, Bob. Thank you guys. You've been wonderful and keep up the great work. It's phenomenal what you're all doing. All right. And off we go. Bye guys.