Running Toward Service: Michelle Boulter’s Path

What if the structure you craved as a kid became the engine of your entire life? Michelle Boulter takes us from dirt roads in Otsego, Michigan to ROTC drills, blistering Louisville barracks, and the jolt of basic training that taught her to love marksmanship and laugh at a tragically soft grenade throw. Commissioned in 1996 and moved into the Signal Corps, she pushed through a back injury and an early exit, then rebuilt her purpose in law—where research, process, and calm under pressure look a lot like field discipline without the ruck.

We talk about the hard pivot points: the campus climate that felt wary of uniforms, the surgery that changed a plan, the 9/11 moment that steered her away from active duty while she was pregnant, and the marriage that started with a missed call, a snowy driveway, and a broken bench. Michelle’s story keeps circling back to one theme: choose your own path, even when family hesitates. Her kids embody that idea—one daughter commissioned in the Guard’s Signal branch, another thriving as a vet tech, a third serving as a Navy corpsman—while the whole family trades acronyms across branches like different dialects of the same service language.

If you care about veteran stories, women in the military, National Guard life, career pivots, and how discipline translates from formation runs to legal research, this conversation hits home. We dig into small-town beginnings, ROTC culture, basic training memories, the realities of Signal school, motherhood during turbulent times, and what it means to plan the next chapter with retirement on the horizon, a new golf swing, and a four-month-old grandson who lights up every room.

Subscribe, share this with a friend who loves authentic veteran journeys, and leave a review to tell us: what hard choice shaped your path?

Transcript

Introductions & Small-Town Beginnings

SPEAKER_02 0:33

Today is Thursday, November 13th, 2025. We're talking with Michelle Bolter, who served in the Army National Guard. So good afternoon.

SPEAKER_00 0:41

Good afternoon.

SPEAKER_02 0:42

Thanks for coming by after work. I appreciate it.

SPEAKER_00 0:44

Anytime.

SPEAKER_02 0:45

All right. We're going to get right into it. When and where are you were you born?

SPEAKER_00 0:49

I was born August 31st, 1974, in Kalamzu, Michigan.

SPEAKER_02 0:53

Wow, 1974. I was nine years old. Thanks.

SPEAKER_00 0:58

Usually I'm the one that's going, oh, well, I was way old at that stage.

SPEAKER_02 1:03

Yeah, yeah. I I you know, I hate seeing the you can drink if you were born by this date.

SPEAKER_00 1:09

Awful.

SPEAKER_02 1:09

Yeah, yeah. I don't even look at that anymore.

SPEAKER_00 1:11

You don't even check your ID anymore. It's like, could you just take a look at it? Make me feel better.

SPEAKER_02 1:15

Right. So did you grow up in Kalamazoo?

SPEAKER_00 1:17

I did.

SPEAKER_02 1:18

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 1:18

So not I well, I was born in Kalamazoo, and then my dad got a job up in um Otsego, Michigan, which is about 30 minutes from there. And we ended up moving up there, and I for the most part grew up in Otsego.

SPEAKER_02 1:33

Okay. What was it like growing up in Otsego?

SPEAKER_00 1:35

Um, it's a very small town. Everybody knows everything about everybody. Um, but it was, I mean, a lot of freedom. Um, we lived out in the township, so if you wanted to go anywhere, you had to bike it or foot it. Um, main shopping was down in Kelm Zoo, so if you couldn't drive, you weren't gonna get there.

SPEAKER_01 1:53

Right.

SPEAKER_00 1:53

Um, a lot of softball, a lot of sports, a lot of running.

SPEAKER_02 1:58

Sounds like you're kind of athletic.

SPEAKER_00 2:00

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 2:00

So tell me about your family. How many brothers and sisters did you have?

SPEAKER_00 2:03

So I grew up with four sisters, they're all older, and I make sure I make that very clear, they're all older.

SPEAKER_02 2:09

Yes.

SPEAKER_00 2:10

So my oldest sister, they range from being about 17 years older than me versus three years.

SPEAKER_02 2:16

Oh, wow, that's quite a span.

SPEAKER_00 2:19

It was a big span. So my first three sisters are about four years apart. And then there's a 10-year gap, and then there's my fourth sister, and then there's about a three-year gap between me and her.

SPEAKER_02 2:31

Okay. So you were the baby.

SPEAKER_00 2:32

I'm the baby.

SPEAKER_02 2:33

Is it all true? All that stuff they say about the baby. Like your parents were just worn out.

SPEAKER_00 2:38

A little bit. We got away with a lot more than our older sisters did for sure, because they grew up in the 70s.

SPEAKER_02 2:45

Oh, good. That's nice. So uh so tell me about what was it like having all those all those women in the house?

SPEAKER_00 2:53

Um, well, not all of us were in the house at the same time. So not as bad as what you would think, but um, I think my oldest sister, because I was four when we moved into the house and at Seagout. And at that time, I think she had actually moved to Texas.

SPEAKER_01 3:10

Okay.

Growing Up With Four Older Sisters

SPEAKER_00 3:11

Um, so it would have been the other two sisters. My second sister was probably there just for a brief amount of time because she got married when I was five to her first husband. And then my third sister was still in high school. My fourth sister was in elementary like me. Um, there was a lot of fighting for the bathroom, fighting for clothes, fighting over clothes.

SPEAKER_02 3:33

Um were there a lot of hammy downs?

SPEAKER_00 3:35

Oh, that's all I got. And we were all shaped very differently, which didn't really help the clothes fitting correctly.

SPEAKER_02 3:43

Right.

SPEAKER_00 3:44

I'm the shortest person in my family by about two inches. And then my other sister, the one that's closest to me, is about four inches taller than me. So I always got her hammy downs.

SPEAKER_02 3:55

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 3:55

I had to roll and peg my pants.

SPEAKER_02 3:57

At least it was popular then, wasn't it?

SPEAKER_00 4:00

It was very popular then.

SPEAKER_02 4:01

Yeah, so it worked out.

SPEAKER_00 4:02

But she had a tiny waist and I was built like SpongeBob.

SPEAKER_02 4:05

Oh no.

SPEAKER_00 4:06

It didn't really fit well. I I wore men's pants better because they were straight.

SPEAKER_02 4:12

Well, that makes sense, I guess, if you were built like SpongeBob. Yep. Well, so what did your what so what did your parents do? What did your dad do that he moved to Otsego for work?

SPEAKER_00 4:23

So my dad's originally from Illinois, Cook County, and he ended up enlisting in the army. Um, he lied about his age to get into the army because he had a very bad home life.

SPEAKER_01 4:35

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 4:35

And the army, he was in it for about two years, and I didn't find this out until you he had passed. Um, and then after he got out from his two-year contract there, he um enlisted in the Navy, and that's where he did the longest stunt was in the Navy. So then he, when he was in a I think about 20, he was over in California, um, Laguna Beach, and that's where he met my mother. And from there he moved back to Chicago and started working, I think, in painting and other entrepreneurial stuff. But then he went to school, got an I think an externship or an internship, um, working as an engineer with somebody down in Illinois, and they had a place up in Otsego, which is Parker Hannifin. So we moved to Michigan, or they moved to Michigan. I was born in Michigan. Yeah, and then um he retired out of there 40 years later.

SPEAKER_02 5:32

Really? Okay. All right.

SPEAKER_00 5:35

My mom was a stay-at-home mom. She did odd jobs every once in a while, so she had to put up with us 99% of the time.

SPEAKER_02 5:42

I I think with all those kids, she probably didn't have time to work.

SPEAKER_00 5:45

She didn't. She was a chauffeur not only of me and my sisters, but then by the time we were old enough, me and my fourth sister, um, my nephews and my nieces started coming along, and they're a little bit younger than me. My nephew, my oldest nephew's only four years younger than me. Um so they kind of got folded into the mix. So she was a running daycare between her kids and her grandkids until she just about passed.

SPEAKER_02 6:11

So you you were your nephews are like almost my age.

SPEAKER_00 6:17

Yeah. Yeah. I take it back. My my oldest nephew's six years younger than me. Okay. He's six years. So, and then after him, my third nephew is eight years, and then my niece is ten, my other nephew was ten, and then there was a twelve, and then obviously there was the big gap.

SPEAKER_01 6:32

Right.

SPEAKER_00 6:33

And then my fourth sister, her kids, and my kids are fairly close in age.

SPEAKER_02 6:37

Oh, that's very cool.

SPEAKER_00 6:38

But I just found out I'm gonna be a great great aunt. So my great niece is actually due in July.

SPEAKER_02 6:45

Oh my god.

SPEAKER_00 6:45

Oh we got we got a lot of kids in our family.

SPEAKER_02 6:49

Does that make you feel old to be a great great aunt?

SPEAKER_00 6:51

At 51, yeah. I don't feel like I should be too great.

SPEAKER_02 6:55

Right. Maybe a great, maybe not, who knows?

SPEAKER_00 6:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 6:58

Yeah. Well, talk to me about school. Like, what was that like for you?

SPEAKER_00 7:02

So high school was sports. I mean, I did my homework, I was good students. I didn't really have to work hard for it. And so by the time I got ready to graduate, um, I was looking at going to one of the military academies. Um I was looking at one over in Vermont. I got accepted there, got accepted to northern Michigan, and I got accepted to Western. And at the time when I went to Western, it was more of like a financial thing. And I had scholarship opportunities there, so I took up the scholarship opportunities and ended up at Western.

Parents’ Paths And Military Roots

SPEAKER_02 7:38

Now, were those sports-related scholarships then?

SPEAKER_00 7:41

Started off with a cross-country intertrack scholarship.

SPEAKER_02 7:43

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_00 7:44

Um, and then when I got in there, I was still working a couple jobs just so that my parents didn't have to flip the bill. They did help. Um, but uh what was it? My brother-in-law was in the army, and my sister had just recently married him. And I can't believe I'm actually gonna say this because he's likely gonna hear this. Like I idolized him. I mean, he was the one brother that I had that I was probably felt like a brother at the time, and acted like a brother. My other brother-in-laws were great, but he was close to my age, very inspirational, and he ended up uh signing up for the army and got deployed during Desert Storm. So it was a very emotional time.

SPEAKER_01 8:27

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 8:27

Um, watching my sister, kind of not knowing what's going on with him, what's going on with the world. And when they decided that they were gonna get married, I was talking with him and I'm like, this is what I want to do. This is what I want to do. And my mom wasn't necessarily for it and tried talking me out of it. It wasn't a good idea. You know, you're a girl, you're not gonna be able to do much. And after about a year of college, I ended up going over and just walking over to the battalion um on campus and ended up talking to a guy, his name was Captain Reisingal at the time. Great guy. And he's like, worst thing you can do is just sign up for the course, and if you don't like it, you don't have to commit to it.

SPEAKER_02 9:10

Right.

SPEAKER_00 9:11

Right. So I'm like, why not give it a shot?

SPEAKER_02 9:13

Nothing to lose, right?

SPEAKER_00 9:15

Nothing. And I'm like, and I can run, get get a little more of that in.

SPEAKER_02 9:20

Um, so you're one of those.

SPEAKER_00 9:23

I was one of those. I'm not so much as I would like to be one of those again, but it's not in my cards right now.

SPEAKER_02 9:29

Right, right. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 9:30

But yes, I was addicted to running.

SPEAKER_02 9:32

You're one of the very few people I've talked to that talked about their military time military time and said I loved running. Yeah, I could run more if I did this. Yes. Said no one ever, except you.

SPEAKER_00 9:43

I didn't like the pull-ups or the push-ups because I have noodles for arms, but I could definitely kill it in the run.

SPEAKER_02 9:49

Yeah, run in circles around the guys, right? Yes. Yeah. Awesome.

SPEAKER_00 9:53

So um, when I signed up for the first semester, I'm like, yep, this is it. This is it. And I didn't tell my parents that I signed up for the second semester, and I just did it. And at that point in time, I'm like, all right, I'm gonna go to basic, I'm gonna enlist, I'm gonna do, you know, the dual fold. And I gave my parents about two weeks to adjust to it. And my dad just kind of looked at me, he goes, I'm not shocked. He goes, Good luck. And then my mom cried, and she she thought I was enlisting and going away permanently.

SPEAKER_01 10:32

Right.

SPEAKER_00 10:32

And I'm like, no, I'm enlisting National Guard, I'm doing the simultaneous kind of program like they have now, just a little different then. And I'm like, I'm gonna still go to school, but I'll be doing both, right? And she's like, but you can go away, you can be shipped off. And I'm like, likelihood is not right now, right? Um, and then from graduation there it was much easier on her. She didn't seem to be bothered by it.

SPEAKER_02 10:59

So talk to me about basic training then. So you you did um basic training like in between.

unknown 11:05

Yep.

SPEAKER_00 11:06

I had to do it between in the summer semester. So um Western finishes roughly the end of April, the first part of May, I was one of the first classes to go.

SPEAKER_02 11:16

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 11:16

So um and where'd you go? I went to Louisville.

SPEAKER_02 11:19

Oh.

SPEAKER_00 11:20

Yes.

SPEAKER_02 11:21

Really? Okay. So so walk me through that. What was it like when you got there?

SPEAKER_00 11:25

Uh hot. Very, very hot. And then when I realized that um to start off, they wanted us to wear our blouse sleeves down. I'm like, this is gonna suck. The barracks were not air air conditioned at all. And um, I'm like, what did I get myself into?

SPEAKER_02 11:42

Right.

SPEAKER_00 11:42

Like, do I really want to do this? And um from there, it was just your basic training, right? Yeah. And after week seven, I'm like, okay, this isn't so bad. I can continue to do this. And then with you know, you start getting into the fun stuff, right?

SPEAKER_01 12:00

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:00

Um and then it's over. And then I had to turn around and come back to school.

SPEAKER_02 12:05

So before we turn that page or leave that chapter, um, like what sticks out in your mind most about basic training? Like when you think about it today, you know, what's the look like what's one thing that you really remember about that?

SPEAKER_00 12:19

Um I really, really enjoyed shooting.

SPEAKER_02 12:25

Awesome.

Sports, College Choices, And ROTC

SPEAKER_00 12:26

That was one of my my favorite things. I mean, my dad had a shotgun, we weren't allowed to touch it.

SPEAKER_01 12:31

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 12:31

Um, so I really hadn't been exposed to guns or any kind of weaponry really um up until that point. So being able to shoot a whole bunch of different things and then being semi-proficient, I'm not like my husband by any means, but um, I really enjoyed that. And when I came back the next semester, I actually joined our rifle team at Western.

SPEAKER_02 12:52

Oh, really?

SPEAKER_00 12:52

Which was a little bit of a shock because we were using the old wooden rifles that weighed about 20, 30 pounds. And I'm like, well, this isn't what I thought I was getting into. But we'll we'll keep going.

SPEAKER_02 13:03

Yeah, yeah, no doubt. Did you get to throw the hand grenade and basic training and all that?

SPEAKER_00 13:06

Yeah, and I didn't do so hot with that because like I said, I got noodles and I threw it and I'm like, man, I really did good. And all I remember is my drill sergeant slamming me to the ground, and he goes, You you you didn't throw it very hard. He goes, You want to try again? I'm like, No, not really.

SPEAKER_02 13:22

As long as that was a pass, you're good, right?

SPEAKER_00 13:24

I passed, yeah, but it wasn't with flying colors.

SPEAKER_02 13:28

So you get back to school. Was that so coming back from basic training, was that a bit of an adjustment for you to be back at school? Or did you just like assimilate right back in?

SPEAKER_00 13:37

It um it was I I like regiment, and I think that's one reason that I like the idea of the military. I like regiment, I like methodical, I like rules. Yeah, I mean, it's what I do today. Right. Um and not necessarily having that structure was a little off-putting. Um, but I think because we did do um PT every single morning, and we did battalion every single night. Um, it wasn't as bad, but I think the the the culture of the school was not necessarily at the time pro-military. Um, nothing like the environment that we have today. Um, but you could definitely feel it right in little some cases, depending on where you were at, what you were doing, and if you had anything military on, you you feel a little ostracized.

SPEAKER_01 14:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 14:36

But um coming back wasn't wasn't bad. I gotta sleep in a little bit more.

SPEAKER_02 14:41

Oh, that's true. So that was nice. Didn't get yelled at quite as much.

SPEAKER_00 14:44

Not as much.

SPEAKER_02 14:45

Not that stuff. Now, were you assigned to a unit after this?

SPEAKER_00 14:48

Um, not during that time, because at that time you would enlist, but all the stuff that you had to do for ROTC, you still had to do all your drills, and we did all of our drills over at um Fort Custer at the time.

SPEAKER_01 15:00

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 15:01

Um, and then in the summer, you would, if you weren't doing basic or waiting to go to advanced camp between your junior and your senior year, um, you could do go to all these schools. Um you still had to do your two weeks, but then you still had all these schools that were potentially options for you. Sometimes if you were really good, you got into two schools. I got into one um each summer. So that was that was about it.

SPEAKER_02 15:27

Oh, okay. Well, because I know uh when I was in the National Guard, we had actually had cadets from Western that would come drill with us or come up to our our two-week summer camp, as we like to call it.

SPEAKER_00 15:38

Yeah. Nope, we didn't we didn't do those because I chose to go to the schools. If you went to the schools, you didn't have to necessarily do it unless the stars aligned and you could, and you could go do the the two, but it wasn't necessarily required.

SPEAKER_02 15:53

Okay. You made the right choice.

SPEAKER_00 15:55

Schools were fun. Yeah, yeah, you got the I Love Me patches as we went.

SPEAKER_02 15:59

Yeah, we weren't really nice to the cadets very often. We every once in a while you get like a shining star, and they were great, but most of the time we just gave them a lot of crap.

SPEAKER_00 16:06

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 16:07

So yeah, you made the right choice there. So you uh you make it through Western, you get your bachelor what'd you get your bachelor's degree?

SPEAKER_00 16:14

My bachelor's in political science, international relations.

SPEAKER_02 16:17

Okay. And then what happens?

SPEAKER_00 16:19

So got my commission in 96. Okay, and got commissioned originally as adjunct, um, adjutant general, sorry. And trying to find a unit at the time that had a space for me. There really wasn't, so then I switched to Signal Corps. And then um I ended up getting stationed with the 63rd Troop Command down in Jackson, which I don't think was there much longer after I got out.

SPEAKER_01 16:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 16:45

So um why I was there was kind of like a jack of all trades. They just put you where they needed you and um waited to go to A school.

SPEAKER_02 16:54

Okay. And uh you went off to A school? Yep. And what did you learn there?

SPEAKER_00 17:26

That Signal Core was not my forte.

Basic Training: Heat, Rifles, And Grit

SPEAKER_02 17:29

Not your cup of tea.

SPEAKER_00 17:30

Communications technology. I mean, I can do okay with Outlook and Teams and Copilot nowadays, but that was a whole different form of technology. Like looking at your switchboard and all this stuff, I was like, I'm in over my head.

SPEAKER_02 17:44

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 17:45

But I love the people that I was there with.

SPEAKER_02 17:47

Well, that's good. So you made it through school though, I'm assuming. Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 17:51

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 17:51

Okay. And what was so what was it like? What was uh what was kind of like a typical day with the your with your unit then?

SPEAKER_00 17:57

Um, it was just, I mean, it was a lot of logistics. I never went anywhere. My this is where my time got really short because I got my commission, went to school, um, and I was out in about 18 months. So I only had, you know, roughly 17 drills. Um, and they didn't really have a whole lot of structure around my job in the the command at the time. So I was I felt like I was more of a plug and play. Where where can we put you to fill your your role? But a lot of it was more logistics, just moving stuff, tracking stuff, reporting stuff, auditing stuff. That was it.

SPEAKER_02 18:34

Yeah. So you kind of do some of that today, right?

SPEAKER_00 18:37

I do a lot of that today.

SPEAKER_02 18:38

Yeah, we'll get there. I promise. So you so your enlistment is up then after 18 months, roughly?

SPEAKER_00 18:46

Well, it wasn't. Um, unfortunately, it was cut short, not to my choice. Um, I when I went to um advanced school for the in the summer between my junior and my senior year, one of the Audi Murphy courses, right? Um, I injured my back. And about seven months later, I ended up having surgery on it. And I passed the PT test, but I continue to have some aggravating problems. So I wasn't necessarily medically discharged because my unit was also more than 90 miles away from where I was at. And they're like, okay, well, before we put you up for review, why don't we take this out? And then if you can pass and you get medically cleared, then you can always come back. And after that, it turned into my husband got a different job. We ended up moving, um, ended up having kids, and here I am.

SPEAKER_02 19:40

Yeah. So did you get married while you were still in the guard?

SPEAKER_00 19:44

I got married when yes, I did. I'm trying to remember. Okay, I got my commission in 96, me and my husband got married in 97.

SPEAKER_02 19:53

Okay. All right. So married kind of young.

SPEAKER_00 19:56

Very young. I was uh 22, he was 23.

SPEAKER_02 20:00

Oh my gosh.

SPEAKER_00 20:00

And then our first daughter was born when I was 24.

SPEAKER_02 20:03

Okay. How'd you meet?

SPEAKER_00 20:04

Um, I've known him all my life.

SPEAKER_02 20:06

Oh.

SPEAKER_00 20:07

We went to school together. Oh, okay.

SPEAKER_02 20:09

Were you were you high school sweethearts?

SPEAKER_00 20:11

No. Oh. That's the funny part.

SPEAKER_02 20:12

Yeah, well, talk me through this. I want to hear this story.

SPEAKER_00 20:16

So I'll start you off in first grade, um, getting small school right. Right. And I see a guy who I was in my class, happened to be his twin brother. And I see him go into the bathroom, and then next thing you know, I see somebody coming out the the other door, which was a different classroom, and it's the same kid. And I didn't know what twins were. We didn't have them.

SPEAKER_02 20:38

Right.

SPEAKER_00 20:39

And so I remember asking my teacher, and she's like, Well, they're a set of twins, they're both brothers, and um, she explained it. So then I had a little bit of an obsession because they were both cute. And now this is on the code.

SPEAKER_02 20:51

I'm learning I'm learning so much about you.

SPEAKER_00 20:54

Well, the worst thing was is I actually had a crush in kindergarten in first grade on their dad.

SPEAKER_01 21:00

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 21:01

And it was told at a wedding to my father-in-law who just blushed and walked away. And I'm like, you guys are miserable. But we ended up being really good friends. We all did the same sports, me and um my husband and my brother-in-law. And um, in high school, we all did cross country. We did track. I tried swimming. I don't swim very well, I think. So um I ended up doing volleyball in other sports, um, but cross country and track were my main thing. And they were like the two brothers I never wanted.

SPEAKER_02 21:32

Right.

SPEAKER_00 21:33

And in middle school, it was like this hovering, who are you talking to? What are you doing? Interrupting. I'm like, I'm talking to a boy, leave me alone. I don't need you here. Um, and they were both dating other people. I mean, and he actually lives a country block away from his family from where my family grew up. So we had this big space in between our house that sometimes it was an acorn war or duct tape war in between.

SPEAKER_01 21:58

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 21:59

Um, so fast forward, he ships off, he goes into the army, he ends up getting stationed down in Hawaii, and I go to I go to college. And it was the first semester of my senior year. Yeah, it had to be. Um, and I have my glasses off, like I do right now, because um I was doing something and I needed to see close, but I recognized the voice across the the drill hall. I'm like, that sounds really familiar. It can't be. So I'm trying to find my glasses, put it on. And we had this one guy that was obsessed with the Ranger tab. And so he was over there talking him up, and I'm like, oh my God, I know you.

SPEAKER_01 22:43

Uh-huh.

SPEAKER_00 22:44

And he comes in, he goes, What are you doing here? So we talked, and he was at the time looking to do like the green to gold scholarship, get out of active duty and last and go to college and become an officer. And so we talked and connected a little bit, but he wasn't officially out at that time. And he goes, Well, be out in December. He goes, Why don't you swing by and say hi? And I tried calling him like once or twice. He didn't pick up. And I make sure I reminded him him that of every chance I get.

SPEAKER_02 23:13

Oh, yes, he was screening his calls.

Campus Culture Shock And Cadet Life

SPEAKER_00 23:15

Oh, he was. And um, I was dropping a friend off over in Fenville, which went right past his house at Christmas time. And I'm like, you know what? You're home. You never called me back. So I whip into his driveway. It was kind of like a last-minute thing. I ended up knocking over and not knocking, running over one of his mom's benches because it was covered in snow. So never lived that one down. Um, and from there we ended up started we started dating, and here we are.

SPEAKER_02 23:46

Do you think it was just because he was scared?

SPEAKER_00 23:48

Probably was. He should be. He still is.

SPEAKER_02 23:52

Gotta keep him on their toes, right?

SPEAKER_00 23:54

Yes. He never knows what he's gonna get with me.

SPEAKER_02 23:57

Yeah. Like a box of chocolates, right? Yes. Yeah. I always say Rubik's Cube, but same thing.

SPEAKER_00 24:03

Or jelly beans. Yeah. It could be a sweet flavor, it could be a real sour flavor the next day.

SPEAKER_02 24:09

Well, good for him. So so you uh you forced your way into his house and ruined a bench of his mom's and and the rest is history.

SPEAKER_00 24:18

I made him date me.

SPEAKER_02 24:19

Yeah. How'd that work out?

SPEAKER_00 24:21

Uh we are sitting at 28 years going on 29.

SPEAKER_02 24:26

Oh, congratulations.

SPEAKER_00 24:27

So, yeah, thank you.

SPEAKER_02 24:28

That's that's nice. I will tell you, I've I've talked to some people, World War II vets married like 75 years. Yeah. That's crazy. That blows my mind.

SPEAKER_00 24:38

That's that's awesome.

SPEAKER_02 24:40

But you guys are on your way there, so that's good.

SPEAKER_00 24:42

We are.

SPEAKER_02 24:42

Yeah. So you uh so you're you're uh you're married, you get out of the National Guard. Is he still he's so he's out of the service now?

SPEAKER_00 24:52

He is out of active duty, he's in National Guard, so he ended up going to Holland, and so he was stationed over there with the infantry unit for a little while, and then it became mechanized, and I think it moved up to Grand Rapids. Um, and at that time he was just finishing the police academy at Kalamazoo Valley, and he was looking for a job um as a police officer. So he had multiple locations to kind of pick from. I desperately wanted to go to Texas.

SPEAKER_01 25:22

Okay.

SPEAKER_00 25:22

Not want to stay in Michigan. And he's like, Well, my uncles doesn't necessarily transfer, I'd have to take it all over again. I'm like, yeah, but wouldn't it be worth it? And he's like, No.

SPEAKER_02 25:32

I've already done it once. How hard can it be?

SPEAKER_00 25:34

Right. I'm like, he passed with flying colors.

SPEAKER_02 25:36

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 25:37

Um, but he had uh an optor opportunity to go to either Benton Harbor, Detroit, or Jackson. And then oddly enough, we end up in Jackson, and this is after I'm out. I'm like, now I'm close enough to my unit.

SPEAKER_02 25:49

Right. That would have worked out nicely.

SPEAKER_00 25:52

Right. And so he started at um Jackson uh police department downtown. He was there for about four years and then five years, and then he um transferred over to where he's at now in Blackmen.

SPEAKER_01 26:07

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 26:07

So familiar with Blackman Township. I used to work on Purnell Road.

SPEAKER_00 26:10

Oh, he that's where he worked.

SPEAKER_02 26:12

Yeah, like right across the street. I was at Consumers Energy.

SPEAKER_00 26:14

Oh, so you were at Consumer Energy. Okay, right across the street.

SPEAKER_02 26:16

Yeah, yeah. I saw those guys pulling people over all the time. Busy, busy group of guys down there.

SPEAKER_00 26:21

Yes, they are.

SPEAKER_02 26:22

Yeah. So in the meantime, like you're uh I'm I'm I'm assuming you're having kids somewhere in there.

SPEAKER_00 26:27

Yeah, yeah, we did. Uh huh. So my kids um are right now range 27 down to 21. They're about a five and a half year span between the first and the last.

SPEAKER_01 26:37

All right.

SPEAKER_00 26:38

And most of that was while he was in JNet when he was working at the city. And um, I ended up taking a part-time job working, you know, claims and insurance down in in Jackson. Um, that allowed me a little time to kind of flex with the kids so I didn't have to take a lot of time off because you know, his job was incredibly demanding and hard to work around. Um, but then when my I think it was when my son got out of daycare at that stage, I was like, all right, I think I'm ready for something different. I want to get into the field that I wanted to. Um my end goal was to go active and maybe do, you know, military intelligence. I didn't get into it because everything was being downsized and not many people were able to go active.

SPEAKER_02 27:25

Right.

SPEAKER_00 27:26

Um, so I'm like, okay, I can do pre-law.

SPEAKER_02 27:31

So this whole time you're still thinking military. Yeah, like that's what I'm gonna do.

SPEAKER_00 27:35

I am, and then 9-11 hit when I was pregnant with my third daughter.

SPEAKER_02 27:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 27:38

And my husband had just gotten out about eight months prior to that. So I was having a little bit of angina going, Are you gonna be called back up?

SPEAKER_02 27:46

Yeah, that was a scary time.

SPEAKER_00 27:48

Very scary. And that pretty much sealed my decision that no, that's not what I want to do. I want to be here for my kids, and I've got a completely different trajectory with my life than what I would have had in the military.

SPEAKER_02 28:02

Right. So you ended up going pre-law then?

SPEAKER_00 28:05

Yep. I ended up doing pre-law, and then I ended up getting um my paralegal certification. Once I completed that, I started interviewing, and that's how I got the job where I'm at Alexis.

SPEAKER_02 28:15

Oh, all right. So how long have you been at your current job?

SPEAKER_00 28:18

I've been there now. It would have been started in 2007, so 18 years. Wow. Going on 19 March 12th.

SPEAKER_02 28:27

Time flies.

Commissioning, Signal Corps, And Early Exit

SPEAKER_00 28:28

Yes. It feels like yesterday too.

SPEAKER_02 28:30

Oh, yeah, yeah. And and the older you get, the quicker it flies. I'm just gonna put that out there for you. Great. People used to tell me that crap all the time, and I thought, oh, no way. And then I'm like, oh my god, I'm one of those people now.

SPEAKER_00 28:42

I looked at November and I'm like, it's November what? 13th? I'm like, it just turned November. It cannot be the 13th.

SPEAKER_02 28:49

Yeah, yeah. It hit me like I remember putting all my patio furniture out in the spring. Yeah, and now all of a sudden I'm putting it all away. I'm like, what happened? I only use it like three times. What in the world happened?

SPEAKER_00 29:02

It moved quick.

SPEAKER_02 29:03

So, what what attracted you to law then?

SPEAKER_00 29:07

I again, it's like the the rules, regiment, um, methodical. I I can follow it. There's a process, and it's black and white-ish. And then when I got into it, I'm like, it is definitely not black and white.

SPEAKER_02 29:21

It's all interpretation, right?

SPEAKER_00 29:23

Very, very much. And um I just I love research. I like reading, I like um gathering information, I like deducing information. Um, I like a challenge. So that fit great. And I'm people awkward. Um, I'm I'm not a great socializer. Uh, I like to try to be a good socializer. It's exhausting.

SPEAKER_02 29:49

I'm surprised. Like, I remember meeting you at the at the golf outing, and you you did a good job.

SPEAKER_00 29:55

I did good. You did. And um, if I know the people and it's not a lot of new people, I can socialize okay. But it will suck my my social battery dry. And then I'm like, it's seven o'clock, I'm going to bed. Peace out.

SPEAKER_02 30:10

You need a little nap after all that, right? Well, so your kids are all off the payroll now, pretty much, right? Or close to it.

SPEAKER_00 30:17

Close to it.

SPEAKER_02 30:18

Yeah, tell me about them.

SPEAKER_00 30:19

So my oldest daughter, um, she graduated from Northern. She's 27, and she's a first lieutenant in the Army National Guard right now, signal corps.

SPEAKER_02 30:29

Oh, awesome.

SPEAKER_00 30:31

And uh she's looking at maybe changing her MOS when she goes to captain's career course. She's like, this too is maybe not like my strongest for today, but she's she's killing it. I mean, she's getting awards after awards and you know, getting praise after praise. And it's so freaking awesome to watch. I'm a little jealous because she's she's able to do all the stuff that I wanted to do, but I didn't do.

SPEAKER_01 30:54

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 30:55

Um, but it's beautiful to watch her do it. I was a little freaked out. I'm like, you sure you want to go? In the army, you sure want to do the military. As a mother, it was a whole different feeling versus me. I'm like, yeah, I can take on the world, right?

SPEAKER_02 31:05

Right. Now you know how kind of how your mom felt, right?

SPEAKER_00 31:08

And I was like, I can't be a hypocrite.

SPEAKER_02 31:10

Right. Isn't it funny how that whole thing comes around, right?

SPEAKER_00 31:13

It does.

SPEAKER_02 31:13

Like when your mom wished that you had kids that were just like you and then you had them.

SPEAKER_00 31:18

Yeah. So um she's she's doing great right now. And then my second daughter is a vet tech. She we the military wasn't her thing. She's like, maybe I want to do it, maybe I don't. But she's also the one that she's she's a brainiac, like my husband. Brilliant. And she wanted to be a lawyer, but a doctor and a vet. But she also wanted to do certain philanthropic type stuff. And I'm like, well, could we just pick one career and maybe get an education and pursue that and then go back for another one later where you can afford it on your own?

SPEAKER_02 31:54

Hint, hint.

SPEAKER_00 31:55

Hint hint. And so she did. She got her degree, and now she's a vet tech and she absolutely loves it.

SPEAKER_02 32:00

Oh, that's awesome.

SPEAKER_00 32:01

So, yeah. And then my third daughter, she's in the Navy, she's a corpsman. Um, and their ranking and their their titles are still a little foreign to me. And I'm like, well, what does that mean? What is that? Is that like an E5? And she goes, Yes, it's it's like that. Um, and she's stationed over in Bethesda. It was funny because her first station um was Hawaii, and that's where my husband was. He hated it. He hated Hawaii. And I remember looking at him going, Are you crazy? How can you hate Hawaii? And he goes, I hated it. And um I went to vacation in the main island, and I'm like, I don't know what you're talking about. There was none of that problem there. And he's talking about like the homeless and the dogs and all that stuff. Well, when my daughter we went to visit her, he goes, I'm never going back to Hawaii over my dead body. And I'm like, Well, I think your dead body arrived. We're going. So get on board. And we ended up going back, and he was a hesitant, but he enjoyed it.

SPEAKER_02 33:02

Right. Well, it's different when you don't live there.

SPEAKER_00 33:04

Right.

SPEAKER_02 33:04

My son was stationed in Hawaii as well, and he like he said it was great for like the first six months.

SPEAKER_00 33:09

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 33:10

And then it just sucked the rest of the time.

SPEAKER_00 33:12

Yeah, because you can't go anywhere. I mean, you have to island hop, that's costly. Everything's costly. And once you see it, you're like, all right, next.

SPEAKER_01 33:19

Right.

SPEAKER_00 33:20

Well, my daughter's a beach person, so it was perfect for her. And um, she ended up getting married while she was down there and ended up co-locating over to Maryland, and she got stationed in Bethesda, and it's different. She it starts getting cold because I think I miss Hawaii.

SPEAKER_02 33:39

She she can always go back though, right?

SPEAKER_00 33:41

Yep. Well, now she's talking about Italy, and now I've got a grandson, and I'm like, You're not taking my grandson to Italy. I'm like, she's like, Well, if I go, I have to go. I'm like, Well, don't make it a choice if you don't have to. Right. Being selfish.

SPEAKER_02 33:53

Maybe it'll maybe they'll be good for him, though. You know?

Marriage, Careers, And Guard Life At Home

SPEAKER_00 33:56

Well, I mean, it's selfish on my part, 100%. But I think it would be absolutely phenomenal experience for her and my grandson that you otherwise don't get in a normal career. I mean, if she's a surge tech outside of it working for a hospital, they're not gonna ship her to Italy, they're not gonna ship her to Hawaii, they're not gonna ship her to Guam.

SPEAKER_01 34:15

Right.

SPEAKER_00 34:16

In Japan, I mean, the experience that you get is it's pretty awesome.

SPEAKER_02 34:20

It is. It is the old what's the old adage, join the navy, see the world.

SPEAKER_00 34:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 34:25

Yeah. I I enjoyed my time there. It's funny, you were talking about how um I just want to go back a little bit. You're talking about how like you didn't understand like the ranks and all that stuff in the Navy, right? I re I remember um I was a fire controlman in the Navy, which means I worked on guided missile computer systems, right? Okay, and so my mom would tell everyone that she knew that I was a firefighter. Yeah, my son's a firefighter, and I finally had to say, look, mom, no, I don't put fires out, I start them on other people's ships.

SPEAKER_00 34:53

I thought that's what it was too, and she had to correct me. Why are you fire control? Yeah. I was like, that stuff doesn't make any sense to me.

SPEAKER_02 35:02

No, none of it does. None of it does. But uh yeah, well, that's the navy for you.

SPEAKER_00 35:06

Well, even the acronyms of you know what we used to call like your LBE, right? Um, in the Army. Um, my daughter was trying to explain to me even today's version of what the LBE was then. The first time she was talking about her flick. I'm like, what the heck's a flick? I'm like, explain that. And she starts explaining it. I'm like, oh, your LBE. She goes, What's an LBE? So we ended up having like this six-month conversation going back and forth of just trying to understand each other's acronyms. And I had to compare it to our acronyms versus her acronyms to understand what she was talking about. Now I've got a pretty good idea of what she's what she's referencing.

SPEAKER_01 35:44

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 35:44

But then my daughter, when she's through the the Navy acronyms in there, I'm like, I give up. I I can't keep up with it. So I'm just gonna sit here and go, Yeah, I get it. I know what you're saying.

SPEAKER_02 35:52

Smile and nod, right? Smile and nod.

SPEAKER_00 35:54

Sure, I'll figure it out someday.

unknown 35:56

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 35:56

So now how old's your grandson? I can't I can't leave the fact that you're a grandma of that.

SPEAKER_00 36:01

He is four months.

SPEAKER_02 36:03

Oh, awesome.

SPEAKER_00 36:04

He's just a little peanut and he is the happiest little clam ever. Just I mean, he is constantly happy. She got a good one.

SPEAKER_02 36:12

Oh, that's awesome.

SPEAKER_00 36:13

Very easy.

SPEAKER_02 36:14

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:15

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 36:15

Well, she knows she can always kind of ship him over to grandma if she's got to go someplace, right?

SPEAKER_00 36:19

I keep begging.

SPEAKER_02 36:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 36:20

And I'm like, you know, I can I can I can put in an AWA to go work remote once a month. And she's like, Well, we may have to talk about that. I'm like, I'm just there to help.

SPEAKER_02 36:32

That's right. It's all about you, not me.

SPEAKER_00 36:34

Right. You need to go go hang out with your friends, go work out. I'm just there to hold the baby.

SPEAKER_02 36:39

Right. There you go. So you're 18 years at your current job. Sounds like you're loving it.

SPEAKER_00 36:44

I am.

SPEAKER_02 36:45

At least that's the reports I get.

SPEAKER_00 36:46

Yep.

SPEAKER_02 36:47

And uh the kids are kind of getting out on their own. And um, you're recently an empty nester or close to it.

SPEAKER_00 36:54

Close to it, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 36:55

Yeah, and uh your husband's probably gonna retire sometime.

SPEAKER_00 36:59

Two and a half years.

SPEAKER_02 37:00

Yeah, not too distant future. Like, what is what does the future look like for you?

SPEAKER_00 37:04

That is a good question. Um, so I didn't say my grand my son is out also, he moved to Indiana, took a job down there. So he does construction, and we're looking at potentially building um the next home. We've looked anywhere from going up to Drummond Island up in the UP. Oh very secluded. I mean, I'm not a people person, but I do need a little people.

SPEAKER_01 37:28

Right.

SPEAKER_00 37:29

And I like it, and it's beautiful. I love the upper peninsula, but I'm not a fan of negative temps and a ton of snow.

SPEAKER_02 37:37

That is not the place for you then.

SPEAKER_00 37:39

It isn't. Uh but every once in a while he's like, You sure you don't want to go? And I'm like, I'm on the fence. I mean, I could go. I don't know if it's I'm not sold yet. Um, I don't like Florida. I mean, I'm at that stage where I'm constantly warm. So Florida is definitely off the table, but something in the middle. So he gets the the opportunity to retire in two and a half years. Um, whether he does or he doesn't, I don't know. It just depends on the environment and where he's at. Um, but at that stage in the game, if he can, I mean, I've got to wait until I can retire. So I'm looking at maybe another 10 years. And maybe getting some property somewhere in between, down like Tennessee, Kentucky is kind of where we're looking at. But both of us are gonna be needing an extra hobby to keep ourselves occupied.

SPEAKER_02 38:30

And so you don't kill each other.

SPEAKER_00 38:33

Yes. And I mean, he he's a bookworm, and um, he teaches on the side. I mean, he teaches at well, he was he's teaching at Siena, which is now closing down. Um, but he also teaches at um Jackson College and he teaches uh psychology because he's also got his PhD in behavioral psych.

SPEAKER_02 38:51

Okay. Um, he is not the cop I want to get pulled over by.

SPEAKER_00 38:55

We don't. The reason he did it was because he was a detective. Yeah. So now he can interview you really well, and he's an expert witness. Awesome. Um, but he uh I I don't know if he'll continue with teaching, so it kind of depends on what what path he takes because he'll be there before me. Um myself, I am gonna learn how to golf better. And depending on where my kids all land, you know, do some traveling.

SPEAKER_02 39:22

Yeah. Well, as long as you're still in this area, uh Alexis and I will be happy to help you.

SPEAKER_00 39:26

Absolutely.

SPEAKER_02 39:27

My golf game sucks.

SPEAKER_00 39:28

So well, she's the one that helped me. I mean, she actually tweaked just little minor things in such a way that I'm like, oh, I know what you're saying. It was like the light bulb went off, and I'm like, it worked. Oh my god, I got the ball off the ground.

SPEAKER_02 39:43

Maybe I should be more appreciative of her help. Maybe, maybe I'll take a cue from you and do that. We'll see what happens. So, do you think that there's things that you learned in your time in the military that have helped you with what you're doing now?

Motherhood, 9/11, And Choosing Law

SPEAKER_00 39:57

Oh, yes. Um, I can be very squirrely. I mean, it's one of the reasons I actually got my office set up the way I do. Um, because you can startle me, because I'll either hyperfocus or I'm watching everything going on over here and I'm not paying attention to what I'm doing here. Um, and I didn't have a lot of structure growing up. My parents weren't big on forcing you to sit down to your homework and being very methodical. Um, and that is one big thing that I took away from it. And I think because I I was craving it and I got it, I didn't let it go.

SPEAKER_01 40:30

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 40:31

So I got a little obsessive with it. Um, but it was it was good for me. I needed that. And the structure keeps me organized, the structure keeps me going, structure keeps me dra driven. Um I think it opened up my personality too, because I was a little bit more of a a quiet wallflower. Um and I was afraid of asking certain questions, afraid of you know upsetting somebody, offending somebody. And then after getting, you know, through school of realizing that I have a voice and you can like it or not, and your feelings are your feelings, and I'm sorry, I didn't mean to offend you, but it is what it is. Yeah, it took me a while, even after getting out of the service, how to apply that, and then it just it it worked and it was great. So now I feel a lot more empowered than I did when I was a teenager or my early 20s.

SPEAKER_02 41:27

Okay. That makes sense.

SPEAKER_00 41:28

I was gonna say I don't I don't peg you as the the quiet type, honestly, but I was a talker, but I was a wallflower in certain situations, kind of like that antisocial piece.

SPEAKER_01 41:39

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 41:39

Um I never shut up. But it was just random things, and I talk your ear off, and I would just sit back and then kind of watch. I didn't join in things is the the big thing. That's why I ran because it was easy. But the skill sets definitely transfer into my job now. I mean, being patient, being able to listen, being able to listen to different people, hear their ideas, talk them through it, being able to research, being able to follow your rules. You remember that little handbook that we all kept in our pockets? Oh, yeah. Love that. I still have mine.

SPEAKER_02 42:19

Do you? I do. Mine's lost.

SPEAKER_00 42:22

And I mean, I wouldn't be doing the work that I'm doing as well as I am if I didn't have those skills. I'd probably be an artist, which I wouldn't have been very good at at because that was the only thing I could do at the time.

SPEAKER_02 42:34

That's a big that's a big difference.

SPEAKER_00 42:36

That was a big difference.

SPEAKER_02 42:37

Yeah, absolutely.

SPEAKER_00 42:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 42:38

Well, we've covered a lot in the last 45 minutes hour. Um, is there anything we haven't talked about that you want to talk about?

SPEAKER_00 42:46

No, I mean, I've I've literally given you my entire family history. It's kind of funny just hearing it and saying it and being asked it. So um, I'm good.

SPEAKER_02 42:57

All right. Well, we've got one last question for you.

SPEAKER_00 42:59

All right.

SPEAKER_02 43:00

So, you know, years from now when someone's listening to this, so I always like to think, you know, a hundred years from now, when neither one of us are sitting here, um, what would you like people to take away from this? What message would you have for people listening to you right now?

SPEAKER_00 43:15

Don't be afraid to go against the grain of even your loved ones, if it's a choice that you want to pursue. I think sometimes we want to please our family to the nth degree, and we sacrifice ourselves sometimes in the the mixed. Um I think that by taking the the chance that people will come around, kind of like my mother.

SPEAKER_01 43:41

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00 43:41

And even myself with my daughters, um it all works out. And it's definitely worth pursuing than not pursuing it and regretting it.

SPEAKER_02 43:52

All right. Well, thanks for that. And thanks for coming out after work and hanging out with me for an hour. I appreciate it.

SPEAKER_00 43:56

I love it. It was fun. Thank you.

SPEAKER_02 43:58

You're welcome.