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Words from the Wise
Join Words from the Wise with Gary Wise, a retired Navy Command Master Chief, for authentic leadership insights forged in real-world experience. Through engaging discussions and actionable strategies, Gary empowers you to master emotional intelligence, build resilient teams, and unlock your full potential. Tune in for practical advice on delegation, conflict management, and inspiring others, drawn from his over 28 years of service and ongoing leader mentorship headquartered now in Ocala, Florida.
Words from the Wise
The Anchor Holds: Faith, Family and Finding Your Way Home
From the dusty baseball diamonds of Dublin, Georgia to the deck of a Navy warship in Japan, Chief Tavares Clover's journey exemplifies resilience, adaptability, and the power of staying true to your roots. In this heartfelt conversation with host Gary Wise, a fellow Navy veteran, Chief Clover reveals how his upbringing in a small Southern town shaped the foundations of his character long before he put on a uniform.
Chief Clover's story takes us through unexpected career pivots – from reluctantly entering as a cook to finding his true calling in logistics. With refreshing candor, he shares how he navigated the challenges of military advancement, cross-rating to create opportunity, and eventually achieving the coveted anchors of a Chief Petty Officer. His perspective on leadership, particularly his commitment to "flawless execution of the basics" and deck plate leadership, offers wisdom applicable far beyond military contexts.
The conversation deepens as Chief Clover reflects on maintaining long-distance relationships during deployment, finding love unexpectedly before his overseas tour, and the profound decisions that led him back to his hometown after retirement. His account of building a life after service – constructing a home on family land, finding meaningful work as a defense contractor, and raising three daughters in the community where he grew up – provides a roadmap for those contemplating their own transitions.
What makes this episode exceptional is how it weaves together the professional and deeply personal aspects of military service. Chief Clover's journey demonstrates how our earliest influences shape our approach to challenges, how faith guides critical life decisions, and how sometimes the path forward requires returning to our beginnings.
Whether you're currently serving, contemplating military life, or simply fascinated by authentic stories of personal growth, this conversation offers insights into finding purpose and creating meaningful connections in an increasingly fragmented world. Listen now to discover how small-town values can translate to global impact and enduring leadership.
I know I was born for this. I know I was born for this. Don't care for the critics. My words are life physics, a force that they can't stop. They just don't get it.
Tavares Clover :I do they forget, I'm not done till, I'm on top.
Gary Wise:I know I was born for this. I know I was born for this. I believe. I believe we can write a story. Hello everyone, hafa Day. It's Gary Wise here, wise Leadership Solutions, and today I've got another Behind the Anchor edition of the Words from the Wise podcast. Today I'm bringing to you a shipmate of mine from the USS Ashland. We served together back in 2016 to 17 when I first actually got into the CM Ashland. We served together back in 2016 to 17 when I first actually got into the CMC program and I got to know this brother pretty well in my first few months aboard the ship and then we got to stay connected via social media and I've got to continue to watch his journey and I'm just really excited today to unpack not only where he has come from but what he is up to today. And so, without further ado, I'm going to introduce to y'all mr t clover hey t, how you doing, man?
Tavares Clover :man, I'm blessed, I'm glad to be here.
Gary Wise:Thanks for the invite, bro oh man, I'm so excited to have you on here, bro. Like I remember, when we first met, we would be talking in the chief's mess just about how you hoped life was going to play out and and just, we had barely met each other. We were already talking about faith and about like just optimism and life in general. And then watching your journey, it's all. It looks like it's all going according to what God's plan, man.
Tavares Clover :Yes, yes, it is. I'm surprised myself, bro. Like I said, god first, you know, and you pray for it, and I kept praying for the right things to fall into place and they did. Thank.
Gary Wise:God Looking good. Ok, so we're going to get into this here. I want to start with, bro, your parents, right, because you do a good job showing them recognition via social media. You do a good job showing them recognition via social media, right. I will see you share photos of, like your mom and your dad and the fact that they're still together. They have a healthy relationship. They've been doing all these things they've been doing throughout their life, Like tell me a little bit about your mom and your dad, bro, because they seem like some very special people.
Tavares Clover :They are. I mean, they're the rock, they're where it started at. I mean, they're the rock, they're where it started at. I mean, it's two kids I'm the oldest, me and my brother. They've been married for 49 years.
Tavares Clover :My dad originally from Wrightsville, georgia, which is the next city over, next county over here. He dropped out of school at like ninth grade, picked up a trade which was carpentry and painting and he went to Fort Pierce, florida, and he followed a man down there by Mr Marvin Wright God bless the dead he's gone, but that's who he followed and he picked up the trade and learned it from him and that's where he met my mom at, in Fort Pierce, florida, and they met, dated a little while and then, you know, I came along after they got married and my dad decided to leave there after living there a little while. He wanted. He told my mom he said, hey, I don't want to raise my kids in Fort Pierce, I want to go back to the country where he was from. So he moved back to Dublin, georgia, left me and my mom down there because my mom didn't want to move, she wanted to stay with family. I think around the 10 month mark, I think my mom said I was about 10 months old. She decided that, hey, she wasn't going to try and raise a child and do it. You know the single route and she moved to Georgia to be with my father and the rest is in the books. Like they moved to Georgia, started a family and that's where everything took off at man, I would say, just watch.
Gary Wise:Looking at the pictures you post to them, I just think that that's such a strong foundation and you know, I I've done research in the past of children who typically, unfortunately, grow up in families or households where the parents are not able to make it work or they're not able to keep it together. And having that foundation to look back upon even as you go through your own life journeys is going to always be a strength. That's probably something that you're always going to be able to be able to. I can leverage that strength in whatever I'm doing, going forward, and whenever I see the pictures you share, man, I'm just like, oh man, look at them still doing it. And the fact that they my parents passed away before I retired Right, so we're able to hang on and be around to experience this part of the life that you're now getting to live what a blessing, right, with your daughters and all that. So, before we get to all that, you grew up in Dublin, georgia. Is that correct?
Tavares Clover :Yep, born in Fort Pierce but, like I said, 10 months old, my mom moved me to Dublin, georgia, and I grew up here. This is home.
Gary Wise:So what's Dublin, Georgia like? Right, when I think of Georgia, I think of Atlanta.
Tavares Clover :I think of I do.
Gary Wise:I mean, I'm not going to lie. I think of Atlanta, I kind of think of the movie Sinners now a little bit. I'm not going to lie.
Tavares Clover :Right.
Gary Wise:I feel like that movie did a very good job. I feel like showing just the culture that may have been, this dusty wool that came out of the Depression and came out of World War I or World War II, and these Americans trying to figure it out right in these small country towns and trying to make it work.
Tavares Clover :What you see in centers is what I tell everybody. Don't picture atlanta. Atlanta is like your normal big city centers is like everything outside of atlanta dublin, uh, albany, places like that. Macon is probably the biggest, the biggest city that's closest to us, and then Savannah. We're in between Macon and Savannah off Interstate 16. So we're, we're in the country, but land wise, dublin, which is Lawrence County, is the second largest county in Georgia. So, land wise, we have a lot of land, but it's still considered a small town because they you know they, the powers that be, they only going to let certain things come here. You know we're growing, but not at the rate that I think we should grow, and part of that is because they want to keep that small town feel so it's.
Tavares Clover :You know we got four high schools here. I graduated from East Lawrence, which is on the east side, relatively small school. Then we got Dublin, which is the city school, west Lawrence, which is where my girls go to school. You know they go to West Lawrence because we live on the west side of town. And then we have a private schoolrence, which is where my girls go to school. You know they go to west lawrence because we live on the west side of town and then we have a private school which is trinity. So you know, school wise we're good, but it's still considered a small town okay, how was it when you were growing up there?
Gary Wise:was there already. Was there four high schools when you were growing up?
Tavares Clover :yep, it's always four high schools what was the?
Gary Wise:what was the big things to do in Dublin growing up? Was it all about athletics and like high school? Was it? Was it about like church? What was that?
Tavares Clover :Athletics and of course church. I think if you're from the Bible Belt you were kind of raised in the church. You know, that's just.
Tavares Clover :it's just part of being raised here. I wasn't, you know, we didn't go to church every day like some of my friends or some of the stories that I've heard, but every other Sunday we're in church. It's just, it's part of life being a Southern, southern Baptist. So, yes, you know, church is a huge thing. Sports, of course is, is the thing. You're going to play a sport, it's just, it's going to happen. You just pick which one and you're an athletic. A sport, it's just, it's gonna happen.
Gary Wise:You just pick which one. And you're an athletic guy. As long as I've known you, you've been athletic. So when you were in high school, which sports did you gravitate to, were you big into? Like basketball, football, baseball?
Tavares Clover :football has always been my number one love, because I started out playing football as peewee and pop warner uh with the recreation. But as I grew and really when I got to become a freshman in high school, I saw then my trajectory wasn't going to be, you know, getting a scholarship and go to college or anything like that for football. And back then really it's even worse now, but back then your summertime football took up your whole summer. You're going to be summer workouts, summer camp, and back then basketball was only really two weeks, like you would go. We'd go to camp for like a week and then maybe work out at the gym for a week.
Tavares Clover :So that worked better for me because I wanted to work, I wanted to get a job, I wanted to be able to make some money because my parents just didn't make a lot of money. I wanted to get a job, I wanted to be able to make some money because my parents just didn't make a lot of money. So of course, like the normal kid, you see other kids coming to school with Jordans and nice clothes and stuff and I'm coming with one pair of shoes, the last, the whole, the whole school year when I got to the age of me wanting, you know, wanting to work. I wanted to get a job, and sports just wouldn't allow me to do that. Not playing football and basketball. Sports just wouldn't allow me to do that.
Tavares Clover :Not playing football and basketball. So I gravitated more towards basketball. Then, um, and my coach, my head football coach man, he's still living too. When I see him, I see him every once in a while, he'll come back to the school. He was livid at me when I, when I turned my gear in because like a personal like yeah, he was like man, I I mean, cuss me out everything.
Tavares Clover :Yeah, it was hard man, because he, you know, of course back. You know coaches, if they invest a lot in you, they don't want you to quit, and they don't want you to quit at anything in life. So, yeah, and then I was real good at lifting weights. He was an avid like hey, if you play a sport, you're going to be. One of your electives in school is going to be weightlifting, which I really believed in that. So I love to lift weights and love to play. But when I, when I walked in his office and said, hey, I'm not playing football, no more, man, I remember that like it was yesterday man, I'm gonna tell you what.
Gary Wise:So now that I teach high school and now that I work with these kids and I run multiple teams through my ROTC unit, I am like a coach, right.
Tavares Clover :Yep.
Gary Wise:And whenever one of the kids comes in, it tells me that they have to step away from what we're doing. And because of work typically is what comes up right. It's either work or their grades, right. Those are the two main reasons that somebody's typically stepping away from me. If I'm putting you off, it's because you're not putting in the work or you're not showing us what we need to be seeing. But typically they're coming to me to step away because of either their job is asking them to work more hours, or their parents or them are struggling with the commitment and their grades.
Gary Wise:And when I remember my first year, I would catch myself getting a little bit defensive like what, what do you mean you're leaving? And then I had to remind myself like this is a child, right? This is not a real. We're not paying them money to do this thing. The priority needs to be their education and their own development and, no matter what happens, I want them to still know that I'm going to be there for them, regardless, right? And so I had to learn how to say it's okay and tell the rest of the team it's okay.
Gary Wise:Don't hold it against that person, cause you know the peers will also respond because they feel like, oh man, you left us out to dry, you're not helping us out, but this person's making a tough choice and I think, as that's a leadership decision that you made at a young age, by making the choice and not do what culturally probably felt like was the path of ease, when you wanted to do some things that were going to help you to elevate parts of your own personal growth right, that's huge. And I think it's also interesting. I can connect with the shoes and the clothes and whatnot, cause I remember. I remember when my uncle took me to the store when I was like an eighth grade, cause he said every boy deserves at least one pair of store-bought pants, and he took me to the eighth. I had never had a pair of store-bought pants, and I could remember until eighth grade when he took me to the store, bought me a pair of pants because my mom made all my clothes.
Tavares Clover :Same here bro.
Gary Wise:And she was proud of that, though right, she was proud of that thrift and I got it. I don't want to disrespect it, but you know, I kind of I didn't know I wanted Wranglers. I might have wanted some Jerbos or some Gets, but I got me some Wranglers for the first pair. But I get it, bro. So when you look back at your high school years, what was that first job you got?
Tavares Clover :It was a bag boy. That was my only job, well, helping my dad in the summertime. That started middle school. Like my dad, like I said, he was a painter, so anytime he had a house to paint or had a job, I was helping him early on. But when I became of age here 15, you could work with a worker's permit. So that's when I started and it was at Piggly Wiggly. As a bag boy I met my first Miss. Miss Sue was her name and I actually saw her. She works at the Walgreens now and every time I would come home on leave I would see her here and there. She would always ask about me and when we moved back, like I seen her a little while back and it's like going back to day one. She was the one who gave me opportunity and gave me my first job as a bag boy.
Gary Wise:So. So, coming through high school, you're working at Piggly Wiggly, you're playing basketball.
Tavares Clover :I would imagine grades are probably decent. Yeah, is that also when you got into cars? Um, yes and no. So where I lived at in the country, we played basketball every day after school if I didn't have to work or if I wasn't fishing. Fishing has always been one of my big hobbies as well. It was playing basketball every day I'm talking about on dirt courts, like I would leave my house ride and my dad bought me a four wheeler when I got like 14. And I would ride the four wheeler down or walk down to my one. We would rotate houses where we played every day. So that's that's really before I got into high school. That's how I became big on basketball.
Tavares Clover :But yeah, their brothers, their older brothers, had cars and in the south a caprice box chevy is what we call it, that's what they had and they would come, you know, come to their dad's house and it would be so clean man. And then my cousins in Florida. I would go down there during the summertime and stay with them. They had nice cars. My dad, he had a. You know, he always had a nice car, at least one, and that's when it started. Just as a young, a young kid man. And when you see older guys, whether it's, however, they got it. Most of the time it's drug drug dealers. They have the money to put that kind of money in the cars. And I knew I wasn't going to sell no drugs because I had already heard, you know, seen, horror stories. My cousin, he died in a bad drug deal. So I knew I wasn't going down that road. But yeah, I just fell in love with cars man. That's when it started.
Gary Wise:I'd say that, culturally, I could see coming up. I grew up in the city but I had family in the country. I'd go out there and their cars would be different but they wouldn't be clean like the cars in the city would be. But then as I would watch you and the cars that you manicure, the cars you currently have I've been watching you progress, like I can tell you really get into the cars. But then to hear that that's a part, even though you're all from the country, that cars was a big part of that there as well, I think that's dope. Again, I grew up in Utah, colorado, so it's a little bit different out west than the south, but I mean your car, your truck is beautiful. I mean right, thanks bro. Okay, so coming through high school, what made you decide to want to join the military?
Tavares Clover :because my dad told me that from the point of me being in the military I mean being in middle school dad never been in the military, but he ran his house like a military person, like what he says goes. And it's still like that till today, today, which is why we bump heads sometimes. We do, it's natural. But from the point of me getting probably to about middle school, he would always tell me when you and excuse me for the verbiage, but this is how he told me he said, when you walk across that stage in high school, you're getting your black ass out of my house. That's exactly how he told. So when you hear that every day and you know, you start looking towards the end, the light at the end of the tunnel, and I'm like, well, I can't go that way with sports. I'm not going to sell drugs and do something dumb and mess my career up.
Tavares Clover :Then I had an older half brother that was in the army and I would speak with him, my uncle, which was a war Vietnam. He, I would talk to him. So when I go visit my aunt and my cousins he would also talk to me. Tavares, he would never say Tavares. He always called me virus, hey, virus, and God bless the dead. He meant the. I mean he meant the best. But he would always tell me when you graduate, just go to the military. I mean he meant the best. But he would always tell me when you graduate, just go to the military. And when you hear those two, you know prominent figures in your life and you know that the sports isn't going to get you what you want. By the time I hit junior, my junior year, I had already told my parents. I said hey, let's go and do the paperwork, that way when I'm, when I graduate, I can leave immediately. And that's what happened.
Gary Wise:Yeah, what do you think it was that was driving them to want you to go to the service? Do you have any idea? Do you think it was just because they felt like the lack of opportunity wasn't there in the hometown, they wanted you to launch quicker.
Tavares Clover :The biggest thing was here, and it's still like this till today. There's really no jobs here, Like when you graduate high school. Here most people go into construction or they go off to college or you get the minute few that go to the military. So they knew if you know, if I'm staying in Dublin, Georgia ain't no opportunities here. And they wanted, they wanted me to do something good with my life. So my dad had friends that joined the military and he he saw it. He was like, hey, it's the best way for a young black man to do well and, you know, have a good life. So I listened and I went off and it worked.
Gary Wise:You know, I think about it. When I joined the service, I had been just a hell of a year in all my teenage years and when I told my parents I was going to join the military man they was about, they were so damn happy. They were just like thank God, because the structure, because of just the change. And so as I think about the different parenting positions and their ideas behind what they want the kids to do, and now, as a parent, right behind what they want the kids to do, and now as a parent, right, I mean, my oldest son is about to be 17 or about to be 18, and looking at making these recommendations, and now that here you are as a dad, you know, and your little girl's going to be older, do you think you're going to approach that transition a little bit differently?
Tavares Clover :For them. Yeah, I wouldn't push it off on them as much as my dad did.
Gary Wise:Yeah.
Tavares Clover :I would support them in whatever they want to do. I won't say, hey, you got to go to the military because college wasn't even an option for me. If I wasn't going to get a scholarship, there was no way my parents could afford to send me to college. It was not going to happen if they had to pay for it.
Gary Wise:Yeah.
Tavares Clover :With my girls. I wouldn't push it on them, but I'd always tell them yeah, it's a great option, you know, great option to to to. You know, if you don't want to go to college because college isn't for everybody immediately after after school, then never, you know, turn your your face away from the military you know, I remember my dad told me when I was like seventh grade.
Gary Wise:He said if you don't get a full scholarship, you're not going to college. And so I immediately like checked out of high school at school. At that point I was like, well then, why am I going to school anymore? And to your point, I'm never going to tell my kids that they have to do one thing or another or that they can't do anything or the other. Right, it's just love them, try to give them as much opportunity as possible, make them work for the opportunities and appreciate the opportunities, but also to know that there is a lot of ways to get to, yes, especially with technology in the future, because, like you said, dublin may still be Dublin, but you got high-speed internet there. Yep, right.
Tavares Clover :You can still make some moves, I guarantee it. Yep, and people are, people are. There's more moves being made now, of course, than when I was here. I see the growth, you know. So it is opportunities here. But, yeah, I never push my kids away like my best friend. You know, growing up, me and him, we was always big fishing, every day, like if I went playing basketball, we was fishing, was fishing, and his parents his dad was in the national guard, but his mom was an avid fan of not letting either either one of her sons go to the military. That wasn't even an option, because I would come home on leave and go down and see him and talk to him. She was like, no, I don't want my kids to go to the military. So it's a lot of people out there that's against the military for their kids.
Gary Wise:Well, it's scary, you know I can hear why. I know why my parents wanted it for me. I can hear through you what your dad was hoping you would find out of it. But then I mean, all hell breaks loose after we joined the military. Right, you had that whole 20-year real trance between the Vietnam War and like 9-11. Yeah, you had the persian gulf conflict, but once 2001 hit it got a little bit wild out there for us. So let's get to that. So you joined the military right out of high school and you came in. Did you come in immediately in the supply world?
Tavares Clover :yes, I was a cook, though. Okay, came in as a, as a m CS, yep.
Gary Wise:Yeah, and you were on an aircraft carrier your first ship, right.
Tavares Clover :GW Yep. George Washington GW Yep.
Gary Wise:Yes, sir. Yeah, CVM-73. You were not a plank owner, were you?
Tavares Clover :No, I wasn't a plank owner.
Gary Wise:And it was in Virginia.
Tavares Clover :Yep in Virginia.
Gary Wise:So how was basic training for you coming from Georgia right? Did you go to Great Lakes or did you go somewhere else?
Tavares Clover :Great Lakes. Great Lakes I think they had just closed down the one in Orlando right before I was because I wanted to go to Orlando. Oh man, I had my sights set on Orlando and they were like, nope, we're shutting that one down. All recruits are going to Great Lakes now. So I was like, okay, okay, shutting that one down All recruits are going to Great Lakes now.
Gary Wise:So I was like, okay, okay, so for context, what year is that when you joined the Navy?
Tavares Clover :98.
Gary Wise:1998. So 1998, you're going to Great Lakes, coming from Georgia. What time of year was it?
Tavares Clover :July. I made sure I didn't go during the wintertime.
Gary Wise:Nope, I don't do well with cold weather. I remember I went there during the winter and I'm from Utah, of course, and I remember all the guys from the south that were there in the winter and they were just like what in the hell is this?
Tavares Clover :That was not an option.
Gary Wise:No, july. I mean, there's different kinds of hot though. Right yeah, in Florida it's hot, but it's so humid outside it's like getting baked, but July and in Chicago you have to get fried.
Tavares Clover :Yeah, it was hot. I mean, it was hot, but I can deal better with heat than I can with cold. So I got here in July, July 6. I got there and then.
Gary Wise:September ish, yeah, september ish. I was gone. And where was your? Where did you go to your A school? Yeah, september-ish I was gone.
Tavares Clover :And where did you go to your A school at? Back then for MSCS it was on Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio, Texas. So two months there, Loved it.
Gary Wise:I was going to ask you because you got some liberty in Lackland.
Tavares Clover :Yeah, loved it. Got to go see the Riverwalk and all of that stuff, so it was nice.
Gary Wise:Yeah, ok, I mean, and here you are, you're young, you're in the service, you got a little bit of money, you got some shipmates that are going to school with you. People don't understand when you're young in the military, you're doing these schools or these brand new assignments. You can make some really strong friendships really quickly with people, because y'all got nothing to do and you got money.
Tavares Clover :That's where I made my Boot camp. I made friends, but A school was where I met one of my best friends. Till today we still keep in contact, because it's a bond that you have that you'll just never duplicate anywhere else.
Tavares Clover :Going through them hard times in boot camp. And then you get to A school and I'm there for two months. And then what really made it better? He was a fleet returnee. So when he he had the car, he had everything. I didn't have nothing coming from boot camp. Yeah, we automatically clicked. He was from north carolina fleet returnee. Uh, he cut hair, so he would cut my hair in a school and he's a barber now. He actually did. I think he did eight years. He wound up getting out, but now he's a barber in hampton, virginia.
Tavares Clover :Yep, nice yeah, I could.
Gary Wise:That's a win. Right there, he got a vehicle. Oh man you, right there he got a vehicle.
Tavares Clover :Oh man you're not walking. You got a vehicle, I can get my hair cut. It just was a win-win. We hit it off real nice, Me, him and another guy. Now the other guy. That's a hard story.
Gary Wise:He didn't work out.
Tavares Clover :Because I took orders to the George Washington because of him he finished. He finished first in a school, I finished second. So you know, the higher you finish, the better you get to pick from the board of orders. Yeah, and he was all. He was from Albany, new York, and he he had a child, had a girlfriend back there and he was like man, I want to get close to as close to New York as I can. So when the day came to pick orders, I'll never forget it I actually picked orders to an amphibious ship.
Tavares Clover :I didn't want to go to a big ship because one I didn't want to be a cook anyway. I took that rate because I just wanted to leave home. I was ready to go and my recruiter was like, well, you can retake the ASVAB. But he said, but you're not going to be able to leave in July. I was like man, just give me what you, what you got, so I can leave. I was ready to leave and, yeah, I picked that and field and my freaking teacher, my school instructor. He said, man, that was my first ship, that ship is old and raggedy, you don't want to go there. So I listened to him. My homeboy had already picked the george washington and it was two billets there. So I was like, okay, so I'm just gonna pick the george washington, I'll go to g-dub with my partner and he man, we got there, kid, the first weekend. We get there and we check in when, when it's on, it's in portsmouth in the shipyard. So the ship is all two apart. They're putting it back together, getting ready's in Portsmouth in the shipyard. So the ship is all two feet apart. They're putting it back together getting ready to come out of the yards. But it was just dirty, nasty and everything.
Tavares Clover :First weekend there this guy tells me hey, man, I'm going home, I'm going to visit my son and my wife I mean my girlfriend and I said okay, I said I'll see you at quarters on Monday. It's a Friday, this dude, monday come no show. And of course they're looking at me because they know me and him are like this yeah, hey, t man, what's up with such and such? I ain't heard nothing from him. I hope everything OK. We call in, call in and nothing. Week go by, two weeks go by, three weeks go by, nothing.
Tavares Clover :He finally comes back, probably a couple days after deserter status. Go to captain mass and when you know I'm talking to him. I'm like man, what's going on? He's like. He's like man, I just don't want to leave my son. He's like I, my son is up there, so he's like that's, that's who I want to be with. They give him, you know, restriction 45, 45. He does his time and the whole time. You know I'm talking to him while he know restriction 45, 45. He does his time and the whole time. You know I'm talking to him. While he's on restriction he gets off restriction and that he get off restriction First weekend he's off restriction. I say hey, man, I know you want to go see your family. I said I want to see you in quarters on Monday. Come on back. I said just do your time and get out and go home. You can be with your family or move them here to Virginia. You know, just do what you got to do. He said I'll be back. I see, I see your quarters. I see your quarters Monday.
Gary Wise:If I've seen that guy since I spoke to him that day Pigs fly. Hey, I respect the commitment though, right, because some people just talk a lot of mess. Right, he really said I'm gonna just go ahead and go. Yeah, yeah, I remember, hey so that was.
Tavares Clover :That was why I got to the gw and, like I said, he never came back. I finished my time there. I don't know what happened to him or anything, or even if if he's still alive, I don't know.
Gary Wise:God bless, Good luck. Hopefully it all worked out for him in the long run. Some people don't really know what they're getting themselves into. You think you can do. I mean leaving your family's heart.
Gary Wise:I was married to my wife, erica, about six, seven years before we had Hayden Getting underway. When it was just the two of us it was not that difficult. But once my son came, oh man, because every time I came back it was like meeting a new little person, right, and that was tough. So I can relate to that. So how did you like the George Washington? I mean, you got to the shipyard. That's tough times but you got out. You got on deployment. How did you enjoy that tour?
Tavares Clover :It was hard. It was real hard. I mean being on an aircraft carrier, not liking your rate. That was part of the probably the hardest part not not liking being a cook. So when I got there, of course they throw you right in the galley. You're on the grill cooking, you know eggs to order for three, 4,000 people and I'm like man, this, this just ain't it. It just wasn't it for me.
Tavares Clover :And, uh, I spoke with my, my watch captain. He was a CS one and we still cool to this day as well. He was like I know you don't like it, clove, but just hang in there, he said. And then I went out the back of the galley one day and I seen guys bringing boxes up, putting them in the little office over there. So I asked, I said, what is that? I said what do they do? Because they were cooks as well. They was like that's Jack of the Dust, they. And they was like that's jack of the dust they. You know they do the breakouts and bring us the food that we cook. So, man, I said, man, I need to get that job.
Tavares Clover :Yeah because they work five days a week, you know. No, every other weekend, like the crazy shift that the cooks work, they ain't got to be there early in the morning, I was like, and they ain't cooking, that was my big thing. I didn't care about the hours or nothing, just the cooking. That was my big thing. I didn't care about the hours or nothing, just the cooking. God bless the dead. That's why he's my mentor to this day.
Tavares Clover :He ran Jack of the Dust, which was MS1 Life Ridge. I spoke with him. He was like I got this MSN that checked in a couple of weeks before you did and he just, he ain't acting right, he won't, he won't show up to work on time. If you show up, he's drunk. He said the next time he shows up late I'm going to swap you all out, I'm going to put him in the galley and we'll take, take you and put you in Jack of the Dust with me. He showed up late the next day.
Tavares Clover :The next day I was in jack of the dust and I stayed in jack of the dust the rest of my time on the ship. I literally ran it because I I loved it. I did, and life ridge ms1 was a about 15 year, first class didn't have a pen because back then you know, back then it was it wasn't mandatory, right you know. So he had never got his pen. He had been on multiple ships so he was working real hard to try to get his Eastwas pen. He just left it to me and they didn't have any worries.
Tavares Clover :I ran the whole jack of the dust all three of my years on the George Washington All of the storerooms, make sure all of the breakouts got done, making sure trucks got delivered, everything. And that's what happened. I told them I would have stayed in. I said, just let me cross rate, let me retake the ASVAB so I can cross rate and get into a rate that I like, because the Navy was easy. I mean I had grew up with my dad that was harder than the Navy, right, yeah? So yeah, I did Jack of jacket of dust and that's that's when I got out, because they wouldn't let me cross rate.
Gary Wise:I remember you know it's funny, that's about that story. I remember back when he swats before it was mandatory and it was almost looked down upon If you had an East wasp and people was like, oh you, a person that's trying to show you that you don't care about your job, you just try to be extra special, or whatever it was, and it was like a pride it was like a point of pride if they didn't have a warfare pin yet.
Gary Wise:But then to your point, the first classes would really get. They would really get a hard time oh yeah the warfare pins?
Gary Wise:yep, uh, especially because he wasn't going to make rank or whatever it was what. What do you think it was about being the jack of the dust? You just think it was not having to deal with all the customer service thing but then having the control over what you were managing all day, because Cook Enemy, that is the heartbeat of the ship. I know, you know that that's a big deal, but I also know that, like you said, you've got to deal with 3,000 people a day that are having a. Whatever their experience is, that's a lot. It takes a special kind of a person to want to do that job.
Tavares Clover :It does. I just think Jack of the Dust was more me because I was moving boxes around. It worked. It helped in favor, you know, because, like I told you, I was big at lifting weights in high school. So I'm like man, I'm getting a workout slinging these boxes around. I don't got to cook, like that was my thing. I just didn't want to cook. I said I can do anything other than cooking. So when Jack of the Dust presented itself, I jumped on it.
Tavares Clover :And I did it to the best of my ability and did it well, and it sounds like you got the chance to be a leader at a young age, early, because you know I'm dealing with the fsas. Like we got fsas in jack of the dust as well and I still got plenty of them that I used to work with that were fsas and we just hit it off man like they would come and they'd be like man close, so he ain't like the rest of the cs's man, he just he know how to talk to us like yeah like yo I said, because I understand, I'm, because I understand, I'm right there with you.
Tavares Clover :We're just we're the same age Like, yeah, I'm trying to get this job done, we're trying to get the job done so we can get off.
Gary Wise:And for all the people listening to this conversation, fsas are that's a acronym for food service attendance. The United States Navy is everyone that joins the military is going to do some time on the mess decks, typically helping to make sure the food gets distributed and gets cleaned up, and they're typically called food service attendants, and I will tell you that they also like to work at places like Jack of the Dust versus working in the mess chow hall or whatever it is or working in the discolory or stuff where it's hot all day.
Gary Wise:I did my time in laundry, man, and that was the hook up. I made so much money in laundry, you had the hook up. Oh, I did. I'm an engineer and I'm in laundry cranking. Oh yeah, I was getting everybody's laundry bags done. Self-service laundry was only mine for a period of the time of the day. Right, I had it all to myself, so they wouldn't let you cross rate, and so you chose. You chose to get out of the Navy. What year did you get out of the Navy?
Tavares Clover :2002, July.
Gary Wise:Okay, so after 9-11, you get out of the Navy. What are you?
Tavares Clover :thinking about doing with your life after you walk out of the service. I wanted to do merchant Marines military seal of command, because those are the ones that bring us the food while we're on the water, yeah, so I'm looking at it. And then I had a couple CSs that had got out and did it. So they were E-5s, though they got out at E5s and they was like man Clover. I'm telling you, we make big money over here doing the same thing we do in the Navy. I was like man, I need to do that when I get out, since they won't let me cross rate. Sure enough, I did it. I got out, did all of my card, got everything certification and Got everything certification and did the military seal of command for about about nine months, because I was married at the time.
Tavares Clover :I had met my ex-wife. She came cranking and she was on the mess decks. So she came cranking and she came from V4 division and so I met her. We got married. I got out of the Navy she still was on the George Washington and I started doing military seal of command. Well, you know we're gone a lot. So you know we stayed gone and she started complaining about me being gone, her still being active duty, and that one didn't work out. So I did what I wanted to do when I got out and I did the reserves. I wanted to keep my foot in the door just in case I needed to go back, and that's what happened, yep.
Gary Wise:So you did the MSC, did that for nine months. Well, how different was being a part of an MSC crew?
Tavares Clover :vice, being on a Navy crew Night and day, cause you got your own state room, you got you know it's. It's literally just like a job on the water. So right, I started out as a kind of like a fsa food service attendant, but they call it uh, uh, what do they call it? I forgot what they call it. It's like undesignated semen or something like that. So I'm working, you know, buffing floors, cleaning state rooms, stuff like that, and then I wound up striking or applying putting my package in for assistant storekeeper.
Gary Wise:That's where I got my first taste of being SK with MSC, when you were in the reserves, did you already have a rate in the reserves or no?
Tavares Clover :I was a CS still In the reserves, yep CS3. I did active reserves right up until I got hired on with MSC and then I went to the IR because I was on the water so much I couldn't make my drills couldn't drill like I was supposed to. So I went to the IR for the reserves and did MSC while I was on the water.
Gary Wise:Okay. So you get to that nine-month time MSC is not working out. Your relationship with the person you're married to at the time is not going the way you want it to go. What do you decide? What is causing you at that point to recognize all right, I got another transition I got to make because this ain't working and I've got to make a move.
Tavares Clover :When I went through the divorce and knowing that I couldn't go back back home, coming back home to my dad's house wasn't an option, okay, and I was living with one of my best friends in norfolk, so he was like, hey, man, you can stay here as long as you need need to to get on your feet. And I went back to the reserves um, active as an active reserve, so I could start back drilling. I said, well, let me see if I can go back on active duty. So I drilled my first drill weekend and it was a senior chief ITCS and she said she said well, what are you, what are your plans, what do you want to do in the reserves? I said, ma'am, I'm not. I'm gonna be honest with you, I'm trying to go back on active duty.
Tavares Clover :9-11 had just happened so they were trying to get bodies back on active duty bad anyway. She was like well, have you ever heard of the, the tar program? You know tar fts? They done played around with the names a lot, but back then it was tar. I said, no, ma'am, I don't know what tar is. She said, well, it's just, you're on active duty but you're more so supporting the reserves, uh, the reserve side of the navy. I said, whatever it's gonna be, if I can get back on active duty I'll do it. I. I did the package. We did the package that drill weekend.
Tavares Clover :Before the next drill weekend it was already back, approved to come back. Yeah, it was just that fast. And um came back as a CS3, worked at the reserve center right then back. Then it was called NAR, naval Air Reserve Norfolk on Norfolk base. But they you, it's on Little Creek base now the NOS and came back and that's when it all started, came back in as a, as a tar sailor CS3, my CMC, still real cool with him to this day.
Tavares Clover :He was like he said well, we glad to have you here at the, at the nos man. He said, but I ain't got no billets for a cs. He said you got to go back on the ship and cook. I said, master chief. I said I can't go back down that road. That was my whole reason. And for getting out the first time, right, okay, he said so you want a cross rate? I said yes, sir. I said whatever I got to do to cross rate, let's make it happen. So they sent me to the little. The little class, I think was like a class. I had to go, uh, for like a week or two to like a prep class. Before you retake the as valve I took that, retook the as valve, got my score up uh, higher than what it was and submitted the sk package and it came back fairly fast again. It was like we'll take him and wind up going from there, crossed over to SK.
Gary Wise:And so once you're an SK3 at this point, but now you're a person who primarily supports the reserve component, do you get to go to a ship right away or do you have to go to another reserve unit to best support them?
Tavares Clover :Well, I'll back up a little bit. So I I wind up doing about a little bit over a year at the nos because I was kind of in between going ma and sk 9, 11 had just happened. So I was trying to make e5 ma's. They was just you take the test boom you make, yeah, hottest thing, selling yeah.
Tavares Clover :So I was like, okay, well, I'm just going to go. Ma Master Chief said well, we got a billet that we need to send a body to ASF on base. He said, would you mind doing that? I said, no, send me over there, I'll do it. So I did ASF for like almost a year. Okay.
Tavares Clover :So I did ASF for like almost a year and just to get my feet wet, see what MAs do. That was a real great tour Standing gate guard, you know, on Norfolk base, and while I was over there they shut it down Like within the next cycle, zero, they didn't rate nobody.
Tavares Clover :So I'm like well, I ain't going to cross rate the MA if you're going to lock the rate up like that. I mean I'm in the same boat that I am as a cs. I need to go to a rate that I can make second and um. So I went back to the nos and that's when we submitted the sk package and um went to a school and in meridian went down there to a school and I uh did the a school and they were like well, you need to go, you got to go somewhere. So I was like pick orders. They had orders to NAS Atlanta. I even know Atlanta had a base Right Because I'm regular active duty. I got the regular active duty mind frame.
Gary Wise:Yeah.
Tavares Clover :And they were like, yeah, yeah, we got a reserve base in atlanta. So that's what I did. I went, graduated a school, went back to the the nosk on little creek base for like a week or two and then transferred and went to uh naval air reserve atlanta, which was that.
Gary Wise:That was a three-year, three-year set of orders three-year set of orders. Three-year set of orders and you're a SK3?.
Tavares Clover :SK3.
Gary Wise:So you're a SK3 Clover recently divorced. There's no barracks, I would imagine at the Reserve Center. No barracks.
Tavares Clover :Yeah, there were barracks there, but they were all full, so I got to stay off the base in Atlanta, georgia. Well, marietta, yeah, marietta.
Gary Wise:Marietta, and that's for three years.
Tavares Clover :Three years and I'm in my home state now. I'm only two hours away from home.
Gary Wise:Yeah, but now you're living in the city but you're two hours from home. That's the 2000s too. That's like lean with it rock with it, yeah. How was Atlanta then?
Tavares Clover :Man, it was crazy I'm talking about. And I met my best friend to this day like one of my best. It was three of us. God bless the dead I lost. It was three of us Me, him. We met in a school because he was cross rating from engineering, he was an EN, and so he cross rated the SK, I cross rated the SK. We hit it off. Both got stationed in Atlanta so we became roommates in Atlanta. So we were close, and still close to this day, like he's my. I call him my blood brother because that's just how tight we are. So, yeah, we got to Atlanta, man, and Atlanta was, atlanta was Atlanta.
Gary Wise:That's all. That's all I'm going to tell people. We had a ball Atlanta. I think it's just one of those cities that I went there not too long ago to go check out the downtown. We went to the Coca-Cola place and all that.
Gary Wise:I loved it there. I'm not going to lie to you, man, I loved the downtown area, but it's like any big city right. You got some areas that you're like, oh it's kind of rough around here. It's areas that it's nicer. But I will tell you, culturally, atlanta has done a lot for the country. At least in my generation, our generation.
Gary Wise:Just the music, just everything that comes out of there. I can only imagine being a young sailor living in Atlanta, because I was a Navy recruiter in Clearwater, florida, and so I know what that was like to be a DC-3 and a DC-2 living in Florida and not having a whole lot of Navy around me and getting to be just like a regular person while also working for the job.
Tavares Clover :That's what it was like, man. It was crazy Because it was like you wasn't in the military and the base was so laid back. Everybody on the base was laid back. It was amazing, man, like one of the best tours that I ever had.
Gary Wise:And then you get to meet all the reservists, right? You get to meet all the people that are only in the Navy on the weekends.
Tavares Clover :Yep.
Gary Wise:And they got a whole real life outside of the Navy.
Tavares Clover :Yeah, man, so that's. Yeah man, so that's. And then, coming from regular active duty, it was a shock to me because I didn't know that that even existed, that side of the Navy even existed, so I was still learning. Then get to Atlanta, take the test. Well, I had already taken the test. I took the test and the results come back.
Tavares Clover :And this, when this happened in my Navy career, I knew it was meant for me to be in the navy. So I, mind you, I told you when I was doing asf, probably a couple cycles before that, they locked it up. They locked ma up, so I wasn't going to cross rate to that. Sk was 100 for fts, like e5 100, just put your name on the test, basically. So I was like that's why I chose sk. Get the atlanta results come out, I'm out. I think I had. I was delivering some parts or something to one of the squadrons there, got back to the warehouse and they were like hey, uh, sk2 clover, we need you to come in. Come in up front. We got something for you and um, I said, okay, I'm coming in, and my devo was there right and he said uh oh, you're out of uniform.
Tavares Clover :Congratulations, sk2 yeah and um, they I'm like I'm at shop because I had been, I had been at e4 for so long. I'm like man I'm, I'm probably just gonna stay at e4. I ain ain't going to never make E5. My divo and everybody else said they said man, who do you know in the Navy? I said what are you talking about? They said you were the only one that were promoted this cycle. I said no, I said you got to be kidding me. It was just 100% last cycle and they promoted everybody. Look at the breakdown. They only promoted one person that cycle and that was why they locked up that cycle as well, but I was the only one that they promoted.
Gary Wise:God said it's going to be your time, bro. Yeah, that's it.
Tavares Clover :When that happened, my career took off. Like I said, I knew I was meant to be in the Navy then and even people like if one of my friends that was on the GW with me. I still keep in touch with him to this day and he was like, he was always calling me the poster child. He's like man, you're the poster child for the Navy. Like your uniform's always clean, you're spiffy, you don't drink, you don't smoke. He's like you're just a poster child for the Navy. You've been on many ships. Usually that's the exact opposite of what an MS is or what a CS is. Usually CSs are drunks. They're damn good cooks, but they got a lot coming with them. I'll put it like that. So, yeah, I still keep in touch with him to this day as well. But it was great man. Atlanta was good.
Gary Wise:So you do three years in Atlanta. You pick up SK2. What are you looking to do after Atlanta?
Tavares Clover :Well, we shut the base down in 2009, so that was unfortunate. They bracked that base, so shut it down, turn it over to the national guard and um, looking to put on first. I said I need to go somewhere where I could put on first. And uh, who was it? The detail at the time being that they were bracking the base, he came down and he wanted to give everybody orders on the spot, right then and there, and he was like he said man, you're a good guy. He said you need to go somewhere, you need to go to the ship. He wanted me to go to the ship and I told him. I said I said chief, I said I don't mind going back to the ship at all, but I can't do. No small boy and the F back to the ship at all but I can't do, no small boy.
Tavares Clover :And the fts navy at that time was all frigates, right, frigates and minesweepers. That was the only kind of ship we could go to. I said, chief, I can't go to. No, no small boy, I don't handle uh, seasickness that well. And he was like, uh well, the only ship I got for you is a frigate out of mayport. And I I said, well, I'll wait to the next cycle and see what else comes open. So he was upset, he went back to Millington and then that next cycle orders to HSC 84 came, came open, which was a spec war helicopter squadron out of Norfolk it's been become now as well.
Tavares Clover :But there was two billets there. Um, there was two billets there and for the reserve people, um, nobody wanted to go to that squadron because they were heavily deploying in iraq, so they didn't want to go to it. They was like, yeah, you're gonna work your tail off at 84 because it just it is what it is, but they make, they make rank. You go there, you're gonna make rank. It was almost like equivalent going to the ship. So, lo and behold, when I told you it was my best friend that I met in A school. We both took orders to 84. Oh wow. So we go from three years of being together really three and a half because we're at Meridian together three years in Atlanta, another three years together at the squadron in Norfolk. So about eight years of my life in my Navy career we were together. So of course we're roommates again in Norfolk. So I go to HSC 84 in Norfolk and yeah, it was rough, hard billet, hard tour, but put on first there, yep.
Gary Wise:That's special to get to have that long with the same person and to have the same booty station. Because you know, like I do, you make these great friends in the military. Then within two years, someone's leaving, yep, right, and you might never, you might never get the chance to talk to them again, right. Or you might like this, like catching up, and it's always a great time, but it's, it's not the same as getting a chance to live near each other, like have a life, and then oh, by the way, it doesn't sound like you're married, you ain't got no kids yet, so you got time to invest in that friendship too. Yeah, because once you have the family and all that other stuff, it's a little harder to have those existential friendships, right, yeah, and that just comes with the game. So with that, with that deploying helo squadron, is that the kind where you guys are going just directly overseas to like forward deploy, to like Persian Gulf?
Tavares Clover :Yeah, we're going straight. We was in Balad, iraq, so, being that we were spec war, you know that was our mission. We hauled the SEALs around in Iraq. All our missions were at night, so hauling SE or rangers around, but our deployment was only four months. You would go over there four months at a time and then come back, so it wasn't like you're on the water for six, eight, nine months or something like that, but you just was in Iraq for deployed when they get mortared and they get people get injured.
Gary Wise:I mean it was, it was a rough time to be in iraq they didn't want to go, didn't want to deploy.
Tavares Clover :you had people at the squadron. Every time it's time for them to deploy, they're coming up with a million you know a million excuses, um, but I wound up doing my tour in 2010 over there and, um, that's where I got my second pen. I got my air warfare right before I deployed and then at that time they had just came out with the EXW pen, so it was a fairly new pen and they were giving it in Iraq and we had the opportunity with the unit that we were with over there. They would let us get it with them and that's where I got it at. So got my pin dual qualified. I was man, I was on top of the world, you know E5, dual qualified.
Tavares Clover :Got back from Iraq and shortly after that, found out. I put on first, and once I put on first, I think I had about a year left at the squadron and the guy that was my LPO in Atlanta was now my detail. So I hit him up and he was like hey, clove. He said you done, did everything you need to do at the squadron. He said you got both your pins, your E6.
Tavares Clover :Now he's like you use the LPO there there's really did everything you need to do at the squadron. He said you got both your pins, you're e6 now. He's like you use the lpo there, there's really nothing else you need to do. So he was like you need to go somewhere now, um, where you can set yourself up to make chief. So I told him I said I got a whole year left here. I said you know, I don't mind staying at the squadron. He said you really you don't need to stay there. He's like go ahead and move. He's like I got a hot field billet. He said I got a hot field billet to be an instructor at the basin, the reserve base in New Orleans.
Gary Wise:Oh, yeah, that's a foul.
Tavares Clover :Yeah. So I was like you're kidding. He was like, yeah, he's like I'll cut your orders right now. He cut the orders. I was gone within three, four months.
Tavares Clover :man, he was like Dang man yeah because it was a hot field and he was like man, I can't get no good instructors down here. He's like you're the sole guy that's for this position. And I went down there, killed it like, did well teaching. You know, it was a two-week course that I taught. I did well teaching it and shortly after that I found out I was selected for chief?
Gary Wise:what were you teaching?
Tavares Clover :it's a. It's a uh reserve course. We had some active duty stalers come, but pretty much for like um, the ls's that's at the nos. So the supply that we do at the NOS, like ordering uniforms and stuff like that, we teach all of that. It's a two-week course that you have to go to before you get orders to go to a reserve center.
Gary Wise:So it was still supply-based stuff that you were teaching, and you were teaching this at a reserve center in New Orleans.
Tavares Clover :No at the school house Naval Reserve Professional Development Center in RPDC.
Gary Wise:Naval Reserve Professional Development schoolhouse uh.
Tavares Clover :naval reserve professional development center in our pdc, professional development. Okay, they got like four or five courses that they teach down there. Yep okay.
Gary Wise:So you got now. You got three years in new orleans, you had two three years in atlanta. Yeah, that's. Those are some beautiful duty stations, man. And what I like about that was not only did you take the hard job and go to that squadron and deploy and do all the things you had to do, but then you had the guy call you up and was like basically you're the guy for the job and you were like I really don't want to move quite yet.
Tavares Clover :I didn't want to move because I was like man, I'm good, I'm good.
Gary Wise:But going to New Orleans was a big deal for you. For multiple reasons though. Right, because it sounds like you're going to make chief there, yep, right, and I believe you also meet your wife in New Orleans as well. Right, I remember that story a little bit. I remember you telling me that story, but before we go to that, let's talk about making chief. What was it?
Tavares Clover :like going through chief's initiation for you in New Orleans Humbling, I tell people all the time like it's a humbling experience because you think you know what the process is like on the outside, looking in as a second, as a first, because I remember as a second, as a first and I'm seeing other people go through it and I'm like man, like they coming back in, they looking like they about to die, I'm like man, it can't, it can't be that bad, man, y'all, y'all. Just it ain't that bad. That's what you're thinking in your head, right, you actually get into it. You're like, okay, now it's all those flashbacks of seeing them come in, you know the way they come in.
Tavares Clover :Um, so it was humbling, man, and, and it was humbling, very, very, very taxing because of the heat. You know it was hot. It's hot in New Orleans, hot and humid. So, and like I said, I met some people that going through the season, man, like I still keep in touch with some of my brothers and sisters to this day Like that's another bond that you yes, once you get it, and you go through the fire together. It can't be taken away from you.
Gary Wise:So how many people, how many selectees were in your group. Was it like a whole base thing, or was it just like york, a little command thing?
Tavares Clover :so it's the whole base thing. On new orleans, yeah, it was like I think it was eight, 17 or 18 of us over the whole base and the recruiters, because you got a recruiting district in New Orleans as well, so they came in and joined us, so they pushed it up to maybe like 20 or 21. It was a couple of them, but for the base-wise it was like 17 or 18 of us that went through.
Gary Wise:What year did you pick up chief?
Tavares Clover :That was 2013.
Gary Wise:Okay, you'd actually been in the Navy at that point. Then about what? 12, 13 years Were you at SKC or LSC?
Tavares Clover :LS.
Gary Wise:They had just did the merger LSC you're in the reserves where you're TAR FTS type. You're in New Orleans. You just put on Chief ItSC. You're in the reserves where you're TAR FTS type. You're in New Orleans, you just put on chief. It sounds like you're enjoying the school there. How long were you at the school before you made chief?
Tavares Clover :About a year.
Gary Wise:A year and a half.
Tavares Clover :Yeah.
Gary Wise:That's enough time to learn the job, learn everybody, get it all figured out and then have still two more years there as a chief to enjoy that ride or so, or so.
Tavares Clover :I thought but that didn't you know? Once you make chief, you in certain places you get that happy boot, and that's what I got so hold on.
Gary Wise:So you make chief, how soon. Where did you meet your wife in between the happy boo and you making chief? Tell me that story.
Tavares Clover :So I made chief in 2013. And we got pinned. I think it was September time frame. So I'm a chief and where I was living at in Marrero the base is in Belle Chase. I'm living in Marrero so in between my drive to get to base every day, some days I would stop by Raising Cane's. I don't know if you ever heard of it Raising Cane's okay.
Tavares Clover :Raising Cane's November December time frame 2013,. I noticed this new female is working in Raising Cane's Because, mind you, I'm stopping by there every other day. It's my spot. I canes because, mind you, I'm stopping by there every other day like it's my spot. I don't feel like cooking. I'm stopping by raising canes. Yeah, I get home, um, so I noticed that she had started working there and december goes by, january goes by, and then february comes. I finally introduced myself to her and that's when I asked her, you know, could I take her out? And she was like I'll take your number Now, me being single from the whole time that I was a previous wife up until now, it's probably been like that's probably like I think we got divorced in 2006.
Tavares Clover :So it's 2013. So you know a good distance. All the times that a woman has always told me they're going to take my number, they never call. So I didn't think she was going to call and before I even got home she had called. So she called and we wind up going out. And we went out and one of the guys that worked with her at Raising Cane's. I had already told him that I was leaving. I had already had my orders to the Ashland. So he knew I was leaving.
Tavares Clover :I didn't tell her that on our first date. So she goes back to work. This guy tells her hey, you know he leaving. So then she asked me. She was like hey, one of the guys that I work with told me that you're about to leave the area. And I was like yeah, I was going to tell you.
Tavares Clover :I just didn't want to tell you on the first date because I liked her, the first date went well, I'm just going to come out and just tell you I'm getting ready to leave. And she was like it's fine. She was like you're a real nice guy. I just think. She's like we'll just see where it goes. See where it goes. I was like fine, so I get orders. And like I said we, I leave in may and I broke it off with her gary. I broke it off with her that like the day I was getting ready to leave, because I just was never a fan of long distance relationships, yeah, like here I am getting ready to go to japan. Um, we just started talking in february. It's may really don't have too much grease in the wheels. I'm like I'll just break it off. It's just easier for me to go over here and knock this two-year tour out.
Gary Wise:Be focused and not be worried about back home. Exactly. How did you find out you were going to go to the Ashland? Did you just get a phone call from the detail and they're like hey, I want you to go to Japan on a ship now.
Tavares Clover :Yeah, kind of like that.
Tavares Clover :Yeah, when I'm, when I put on chief um my current chief which me and him we're still cool to this day as well. He had the. It was only one chief billet at the schoolhouse, for our rate, he was in that billet, so I knew I wasn't going to stay there. And um, then the detail called me. He was like hey, I got these orders and the orders have been sitting on our board for probably about two or three cycles prior to the chief results coming out. And I knew some of the chiefs that were in their window prior to me getting selected and they were like no, they didn't want to go to a ship so they wouldn't select them. So these orders are just sitting out there. And the detailer already knew. He was like okay, I got chiefs coming up. One of them chiefs is going to take these orders. So that's how it happened. He called me. He was like hey, I got these orders to the ashland. Uh, that's where you're going. I said, uh, okay, that's fine. And he was like uh, so I started researching the ship.
Tavares Clover :Ship says home, port says little creek, virginia. Cool, I'm going back to. I done did most of my career in Virginia. I can make it work the ship. Life ain't nothing to me. I done, been on the ship before. Give me a chance to get my East Wash pen.
Gary Wise:Going back as a chief is different right.
Tavares Clover :Yeah, going back as a chief, I'm good. The next day because on the internet it still said it was in Little Creek. The next day he called me. He said oh, I forgot to tell you they did a home port change they're in sasabo, japan, now click up and hung the phone. I was like, oh man, like I don't want to go way to japan, like I never been wanting to be, wanted to be stationed overseas. I don't mind deploying or doing anything like that, but I didn't want to be stationed overseas.
Gary Wise:Yeah.
Tavares Clover :And so that's why I kind of went with a bad taste in my mouth the way it went down. And then, when I got over there before you became the CMC, yeah, at Bronner, I think his name was Bronner yeah, as a CMC, it just opened my eyes up. Man, the world is bigger than the United States. Like I tell people, it wound up being one of my best tours ever. Just, you know, out of you going to a place and having a certain way thinking that you're going to, you know it's going to be like this and it being night and day different. Man, it was one of the best tours that I ever did.
Gary Wise:So we're going to get into that. So you get told you're going to get the orders, you're going to Japan. You said, okay, you meet the love of your life, even though at this point in time you're not quite ready to admit that because you're faced with this move, you got to go on to Japan and you don't want to go there, conflicted because you, god, you're moving overseas, right, and you don't know how. God. You're moving overseas, right, and you don't know how does that work, where y'all decide to stay in touch while you're over there.
Tavares Clover :That was more so on me than her.
Gary Wise:Okay, because I remember one of the days we were talking in the mess and you were like sending her a pair of shoes or something like that right, yes.
Gary Wise:And you was like, showing me some shoes, and you're like I got to get her these nice shoes, I get her these little things here and there and I was like that's pretty, that's pretty cool. You're over there taking care of taking care of bins. But then you would also be like, hey, we're gonna see how it works when I get back home. So okay, so you did. Two years on the ship right years yep all right, so let's get into it.
Gary Wise:What was that like when you first got to the ship, when you first got to japan? Did you get? Did they pick you up at the airport, did you? I mean, your first time going to japan? Did you have to ride the bus? The bus to base?
Tavares Clover :so, yeah, all that you know, getting to sasebo is a trip in itself, so yeah flight from atlanta straight to tokyo, narita, then another hour flight from Narita, tokyo, to Fukuoka, then the bus ride, like a two-hour bus ride from Fukuoka down to Sasebo. So it just goes to show you how good God is and how small the Navy is. He's a master chief. He retired as a master chief as well. He was stationed on the BHR Ihr, I think. Yeah, he was on the bhr.
Tavares Clover :Me and him was just stationed together at 84. Okay, he picked me up when I got off the bus like midnight in sasebo. He picked me up, took me to my room, made sure that everything was set for me to get checked in, you know, making sure that I was good to go. So I can't thank him enough. Like me and him, we still. He lives in australia now he retired and him and his wife were in australia. So him and joy, as his wife, man, they they took so good care of me, man um, to make sure that I was set up and everything was good to go where was the room you got to go to?
Gary Wise:did you have a barracks room already set up for you?
Tavares Clover :yeah, they took me to the barracks room because the ship was out to sea oh, okay, got it, so you went, they were out. So they took me to the you know tpu and all of that stuff. I got set up with them the next day but, um yeah, they took me to a room and got me set up and, uh, waited until the ship came back how?
Gary Wise:so? What was that like the first day the ship comes back and you actually see it? You go on board. You know you haven't been on a ship since the aircraft carrier days. What was that like walking on board Ashland and like this is home for the next you know, two years.
Tavares Clover :A shock, a huge shock, because First, when I get the S1, they're looking at me like man, this cat, he too young to be a chief, like he looked like one of us. Yeah, the Mets members were very cool. You know the CMC Steve at the time he he brought me, took me, walked me around, um, met the mess members and uh, it just was a shock man, because for one, I had never been on a ship as a s, as a ls, had never been on, hadn't been on a ship in a long time since the gw. So it was just a shock man. But uh, my, the people that I work with I don't say the sailors work for me, we work together. I mean we were a team, like they told me from the point, from my first day on that ship they was like, hey, chief, we know you, you know you FTS, you don't know how to you know regular active duty thing goes. We got you and when they told me they had me, they had me Like my LS one. We still cool to this day.
Tavares Clover :He's a chief now doing. Well, he was a. I'll say he was a. He was one of those quiet guys.
Gary Wise:Was he the sailor that went through that real rough time?
Tavares Clover :No, no, no, no, that wasn't him.
Gary Wise:Because you had another one. I remember that went through a real rough period. Man, when I first got there and I don't know whatever happened to him, I heard that it all went away, but I don't know how he's doing. I'm not tracking, I forgot which one that was.
Tavares Clover :But yeah, um yeah, my ls1 man he was. He was it, he knew him and I had a great ls2 and I had a great LS2 and I had a great semen, like we from E3, e4, e5, e6. To me it was a good, it was a great group man.
Gary Wise:You had a good shot.
Tavares Clover :Yeah, I have no other than the one that was. That was pretty much it. It was a great shot, man. I couldn't ask for anything better.
Gary Wise:OK. So looking at that two year hit, uh, because when I got there you was everything. And when I got there you were pretty much involved and you were. You were like on your last three months about to leave the boat, um, but you were, I could tell. You had your fingers in a bunch of different things. You had the pulse of the mess of a bunch of different areas. What were your biggest takeaways from that time? You got to spend in the afloat chief's mess on board that ship.
Tavares Clover :Don't take anything for granted and don't don't think you're bigger than the goal. The goal of the Ashland was what we did, you know. So there you can't. A lot of times people think that, like, if I would have went in there with the big head, like'm a chief, I'm, I'm this, I'm that that tour could have went a a total different way.
Tavares Clover :But I went in there humble, wanting and willing to learn not only the ls job but everybody else's job as well. So, like I said, it was just being humble man, like and I've always been like that my whole life like I'm just a humble individual, like I'm not gonna get the big head just because I made chief. Um, then my guys would have looked at me totally different, like, hey, he think he better than us. So, yeah, you know, I, I attacked it the way that I knew best. Even if it was like a job that I knew, maybe a seaman or something like that would be. I'd be like, hey, man, let me help you out, let me learn this. What are you doing? Show me how to do it, because if you're not here then I need to know how to do it. So that was the best way to attack that and it worked out.
Gary Wise:I will tell you, that became the secret to our success on board Ashland as well was because I would tell the mess like, look our job. We all got different rates, but that's none of our job. Our job is to professionally embark the United States Marines, take them wherever they gotta go, treat them well and then send them ashore and take them back home when we're all said and done and and it's to help each other out, and I would always be dealing with people trying to like carve out their own little area and have their little division. I would just blow that away because I'm like nah, bro, like that's not.
Tavares Clover :We all got to be on the same page and the same team and to focus on the mission, and I think that's the biggest challenge anybody has in a leadership position is everybody focused on the same direction, you know it is, and that's why I take my hat off to people like you, um, that become cmcs, because that's a hard job, bro, like you said, to try to keep everybody going in the same direction, focus on the same goal yeah you got these.
Tavares Clover :You know certain ones that want to, like you, say carving this out here or do it their way. This, like the cmc job is, is hard. I wish some. Sometimes people say, well, do you regret not finishing it? You know like not going to to e9, yes and no, I know why I stopped. You know I know why I stopped. So, yes, part of me wanted to get that second star, but the other part of me, when I look at my girls now man and I'm like man, that's like one of the best feelings in the world when I get off work now and they just just to them to run in my arms bro.
Gary Wise:Well, all right, let's get into it. Right? So you're getting ready to leave Ashland or you're looking down the hatch, your last year on Ashland. How do you and this woman you had met before you departed not only stay connected but then decide hey, we're going to try to do something after you get back from Japan?
Tavares Clover :What goes on there. So, probably within the first couple of months of me being on board to Japan, on board to Ashland, I tell people it was God. I was sitting in my apartment one day and it was like he just spoke to me like hey, that's the one that I sent to you, I sent her for you. You need to make it work. I called her and I told her. I said, hey, I know I broke it off. We broke it off before I left New Orleans. But I said I want to do the long distance thing. I said I don't think I know at this point of my life that me trying to go from woman to woman, enjoy that fast life, that ain't it Like I'm going to do what I need to do to be the man that you need to be, even though I'm over here in Japan. So we made it official.
Tavares Clover :Uh, like I said, probably within four months of me being on board to ashland, did the whole long distance thing, um, and I think that helped me out a lot too to keep my, my head clear because, oh my goodness, the the devil was busy. I could, like I said, that could have went a total different way if I would have been the the same old clover that I used to be as a five Right. That's how a lot of people get messed up. Because I'm for deployed, I got all of these young sailors, that's.
Tavares Clover :I hear the whispers, you know, you hear them. Whether you answer to them, that's a whole different thing, but you hear. So I got here, I'm hearing all of the whispers. You know you got certain sailors. The devil is always busy, so they always going to try and do certain things. And by me having her back there, I knew I didn't want to. I didn't want to mess that up. It would have just been a tragedy for, or another story. Oh, this chief is, you know, getting busted down because it is so you know, we heard him all the time. So I didn't want to be one of those guys because it is so.
Gary Wise:You know, we heard them all the time, so I didn't want to be one of those guys. You know, like I know, man geo, bachelor tours are, unfortunately, where people have some of the biggest downfalls yeah and I thank god for my wife as well, because I know that it wasn't.
Gary Wise:I know god brought her to me. I know that she was the one meant for me, but it was also that I relied upon her presence in my life to protect me from all those other things and even the times that I had to do overseas without her for months, even though I knew I was coming back home quickly. I wouldn't even leave the job. You saw, I won't even go on Liberty. I stayed my butt on the ship because I didn't trust nobody. Man I'm not messing this up, man, this is my life.
Gary Wise:I'm not making no bad choices and I think that you're probably right on, and I think it's dope that you were so attuned to the spirit in that moment that you felt it and that she was receptive enough to receive that phone call. I'd be like you know what man I didn't even know. I want to be with you right now.
Tavares Clover :Exactly.
Gary Wise:But she was open to hearing what you had to say and then y'all kept it going. So when you got back from Japan and y'all been doing the long-distance thing, was she still in Louisiana and where were you going back to when you got what was your next set of orders?
Tavares Clover :she was yeah. So you know, I went home twice while I was in japan, each christmas and I spent. I spent half of it with her, then I would fly to georgia and spend the second half with my parents. Um, so when I got back, I had orders to jacksonville, to the echelon, for command, for FTS side. So it's the people that inspect the NOS, the reserve centers Okay, so we have them. It's like eight of them all throughout the country.
Tavares Clover :I went to the one in Jacksonville. Jacksonville has always been one of my dream duty stations. I tried to get there my whole career. Yeah, just could never get there. And when I got that opportunity, coming from the Ashland, I was like this is it. I got to take it.
Tavares Clover :I called the detailer and he was like and me and him are real cool to this day too. He was like man, you crushed it over there. You represented the FTS community so well. He's like, literally wherever you want to go, community so well, he's like, literally wherever you want to go, I'm going to make it happen.
Tavares Clover :And those orders had just popped like a month before I was into my window and he was like yeah, if that's where you want to go, that's where you're going. So I hit him up and then my best friend, the one that passed away last year from colon cancer, which was a master chief, like I told you, it was three of us me, him and my other best friend Now he was the detailer at the time. So he was like Clove, I know you've been trying to get to Jacksonville. He's like this is your opportunity. So, yeah, he cut the orders and I was there and my wife was my girlfriend at the time, she was still in Louisiana was there and my wife was my girlfriend at the time, she was still in Louisiana. So when I got back I flew to Louisiana we we had a smaller wedding right there in her town.
Gary Wise:And then I went to Jacksonville and we started. We started from there, man, and I remember you told me you was going to probably retire. I remember you waffling back and forth, but you would also say I'm looking at retirement, thinking about doing something else in my life. But did you not make the decision all the way until y'all had your first daughter? Or did you already know that you were going to retire after that Jacksonville?
Tavares Clover :tour. Well, when I had the conversation with the detail it was terminal then At the time there was no other E8 billets in Jacksonville for.
Gary Wise:FTS.
Tavares Clover :I was in the only FTS 8 billet in Jacksonville. So he told me when he gave me the orders he was like, hey, either you're going to retire or you're going to leave Jacksonville. And I was like I really don't want to leave Jacksonville. So I kind of was, it was already in the back of my mind. And then, um, when we had our first daughter, I was like, yeah, this is a C minute right here. And I even I reached out to him again.
Tavares Clover :I said, hey, man. I said any way I can get a regular active duty billet. I just left one on the Ashland. Now let me get one of these here in Jacksonville. He said, nah, ain't none of them in Jacksonville going to be able to be for you to go to? He said you'd have to go back to Virginia and if you wanted to stay in, I said well, let me go and start setting myself up for retirement and my CMC that was with me at RCC, which is the red comm now. But he was like man, I don't want to see you retire, man. He's like man, you just you're that guy. He's like you're going to make Master Chief first time up. I said yeah, I know I probably will. But I said but I'm tired of moving, I don't want to go back to Virginia this time and I just started my family. So me starting my family, welcoming our first daughter.
Gary Wise:I said I think it'll be the best, best time for me to punch out right now, and that's when I made the decision to retire. So when you retired and you and you was your wife on board with whatever you chose, or did she really want you to retire as well? Did she really have a person?
Tavares Clover :She didn't really. She was either way. Whichever way I went, she probably would have been happier if I would have stayed in, because she, she had never really left Louisiana in, because she, she had never really left louisiana, yeah. So, like I said, I got married to her at the back tail end of my career. She hadn't been with me my whole career, so she probably would have got a chance to see some more places. So that was her only. But she was. She said, whatever you was going to do, I'm, I'm supporting you, so that's that's not for nothing.
Gary Wise:When, when I was retiring, my wife was the same way she my wife I was so sick and tired of certain things in the United States Navy that I was just done and she wanted me to. I think she wanted me to stay in and keep going and just to keep on taking it at people to keep fighting the fight, you know, but I was tired of fighting the fight.
Tavares Clover :I was just like it's tiresome, especially, like I said, your seat as a cmc man. Pretty sure you've seen stuff that I would just would never even have a chance to see. Y'all do so much, man. You got to deal with the junior sailors. You got to deal with the e6s. You got to deal with your chiefs mess. Then you got to deal with being in that triad, that circle, so you're melding so many pots together, man. It's a lot for y'all yeah, it's a, it was.
Gary Wise:It was a very interesting road. I'm glad I did it, but I'm also I was to the point where the fights I was having were much bigger than just a unit level command. Right, I was focusing on the bigger picture things and what I learned is, once you retire from the military, it's almost pointless to have had all those fights to begin with, right Like, focus on your area, focus on your ship, focus on your mess and all that other stuff is going to get figured out regardless. It's like getting emotional about politics, right Like, at the end of the day, you know, when I retired from the Navy, I said I want to focus on my church, I want to focus on my community, I want to focus on my, on my family and those. Those are three things that I want to worry about. Right so, my church community I want to be an involved participant. I want to have a community where I can build a team that if, if, if we need each other after a storm or whatever it is, we can come together and figure it out. I wanted to work in the high schools because I wanted to give back to the kids and I wanted to help out there. And then I wanted to become a part of a community because I loved those things and I wanted to not worry about the government and the politics and all the embezzlement and the money because, honestly, I got to see so much levels of corruption in the service that I was like, bro, this is sickening, it's sickening.
Gary Wise:Then you go back to the regular chip, the regular cheese special, like, oh, here it is, thank God I'm back to church again. It's holy. Here I was just. That was the problem. My wife knew she was just, that was the problem. And my wife knew she was like you can go out and do great things. And I was like, yeah, but you know what? It ain't worth my own mental health, trying to fight against the matrix with all these people that they don't want the swamp to be drained. You know what I'm saying? They want to keep us swampy. But she supported me. I will say she supported me, me. But it was just the unknown right. And what's life gonna look like after retirement? So you retired, how did you decide? Or why did you decide, to go back from florida, then back to georgia?
Tavares Clover :so retiring right in the middle of covid, which was, in itself, you know, having me guess, second guessing, what I'm doing Like should I be doing this?
Tavares Clover :Should I just stay, not knowing job security or anything like that? I said, well, I'm a push forward. I put I always put, put it in God's hands. He going, he going to make a way. So I went ahead and push forward with retirement, and when we first got well, not when first I got to Jacksonville in 2016.
Tavares Clover :In 2018, me, my dad and my brother bought some land here back in my hometown. We bought 24 acres of land and it was always a what if, just in case, scenario. If I decided to move back home, it would be a place that I could hopefully build my house and move back here. So when I retired in 2020, we wanted to stay in Jacksonville because my wife loves water. She's from Louisiana, so that was part of the deal. She was going to have to be around water somewhere. So she loved it there in Jacksonville, and so did I. I was three hours away from home, which wasn't terrible in Jacksonville, and so did I. I was three hours away from home, which wasn't terrible, right in. You know being in Florida tax free, you know you don't got no state taxes, so that was it had a lot of ups to it.
Tavares Clover :But then, once we decided looking at homes, we rented our first year there. Then we bought a house right down the street from where we were renting that in another subdivision and we were over the subdivision life. We didn't want to be in a subdivision, no more, and we wanted a little bit more space. So we started looking at buying some land in Jacksonville, on the outskirts of Jacksonville, and it just wasn't cost effective. So, uh, for the same amount of money that we paid for the 24 acres here in Georgia they were selling for one acre in Jacksonville. So I told my wife I said well, we got land back in my hometown. It probably would be a little bit easier to build back there versus here. Cost of the house is going to be, you know, way more here in Jacksonville. So she was like well, if that's what you want to do, then we'll just go back there. And part of it again too, is I'm the oldest, my parents are getting older, so when they start their health starts to decline. Versus me being three hours away, I'm 15 minutes away now. So that's another reason why we decided to move back here.
Tavares Clover :And it wasn't an easy task. I tell people all the time, a lot of dominoes fell into the right place and I had a lot of help from people that I went to school with high school One of the guys that helped me with the loan and everything we were in high school together and he's the president of the bank here in Dublin now. So just having friends over all of those years and them following your journey. When I hit him up because he was literally like the last option for me, I hit him up and he was like boom, boom, boom. This is what we're going to do. And it went off. The dominoes started falling all into the same area.
Gary Wise:It is so powerful that you just said that, because a lot of the people that watch my shows or my podcasts are my students. Right, A lot of them are my students and I'm always telling them, because we're in a small town in Florida called Ocala right, right there in the middle of Florida.
Gary Wise:Yeah, people call it Slowcala, right, but it ain't that slow, but that's what they call it, right.
Gary Wise:And I'm telling these kids I'm like, look, y'all get the chance to spend five days a week in a networking environment for the next four years.
Gary Wise:You get to be around all these kids, you get to be around all these instructors, you get to have access to all these different people. Kids, you got all these instructors. You get to have access to all these different people, and you don't know which one of you is going to grow up and be somebody someday, right, and so you might want to think about the relationships you're having here in high school, because this might be somebody you want to give money with in the future somehow. And then here you are telling them look the look, the president of the bank and I went to high school together, and so that was a relationship that I was able to leverage in the future to give my family the opportunity to build our dream home on this land. And I'm hoping they're listening because, again, it ain't worth being mean to people in school or being like rude, because you just don't never know who people are going to grow up to be someday yep you never know, you never know, that bridge.
Tavares Clover :You don't want to burn those bridges, powerful, bro, power.
Gary Wise:you know I love you know. The other thing I love about the small town is and we've got. You know I got jacksville two hours away, tampa two hours away, orlando two hours away, so we got plenty of city around us, but we still feel like we're a small town. But you go to a Friday night football game, man, you want to see America, bro. America is on the sidelines. It don't matter how much money you make and it don't matter how tall you are, it don't matter if you're skinny or fat. We all up in them stands having a good dang time watching these kids play football. It's so inspiring After being overseas, because when you're overseas you start to feel like, oh my God, I don't ever want to go back to America. It's crazy back there. Everyone back there is wild. I love living in a small town because when we went to Jacksonville the other day, I see my wife and I and it was the traffic alone was like, oh my God, crazy.
Tavares Clover :It makes you makes you really like and love living in a small town when you go to bigger cities because, like, when we go to Atlanta we'll go up there. We still want to take the girls to the aquarium and stuff like that. But, just that traffic alone, man, is mind-boggling. Then you're like man, you're in a small town, you can get from point A to point B pretty quick, but not in them big cities.
Gary Wise:Part of why I started doing this whole technology thing was the students and I. We've got an Instagram account for our Knights Battalion and one of our little reels went just 2 million views, viral, right, Wow. And I'm and I'm sure I'm like, I'm showing them, like, look, you don't just have to leave Ocala. We've got technology that you could figure out ways to leverage the computers, the system, and then you could still take care of the community, the family. Now, if you feel the call to serve, I got it. If you feel the call to go to go somewhere and God's got a plan for you, that I got it. But be open to a lot of ways to be of service to your community as well, because I don't want them to feel like they're limited just because they live in a small town.
Gary Wise:That being said, if there are certain things you want, like if you want to go work in that aquarium, then you might got to go to Atlanta to get that job. I want to do something like that. So what are you doing now for work in yours in Georgia? Are you work? Are you doing all? Give your own, your own business. You have a job. How's that going?
Tavares Clover :So I work on one of Robbins Air Force Base here. So it's a it's an hour drive from my house to the base and of course, you know, before we got our new POTUS in we were all teleworking and love, you know, loving life. But now everybody's back pretty much in office. But with me being a contractor, I don't have to go every day because they don't have space for the contractors. That's the biggest problem that they're dealing with now. Uh, like the VA here, the base where I'm at a lot of other bases too, Um, they just don't have the space for the bodies. So the way our base handled it, they said if you're a contractor, uh, we will work to get you all back on the base. So right now I just go. I work from home Mondays, Thursdays and Fridays. I go to the base Tuesdays and Wednesdays, but I'm a case manager for foreign military sales for the C-130 aircraft.
Gary Wise:OK, wow.
Tavares Clover :Yeah, it's, it's a. It's an eye opening experience because, like I said, air Force, navy different terminology, different systems, different everything but I've been there for about two years now and I like it, I like the people. It's a small little group that I work with. It's only about 10 or 15 of us for what we do and, like I said, right now, I just go Tuesdays and Wednesdays and work from home, out of my detached, which is where I'm shooting this at right now. Just work from home the other days and, like I said once again, because here in Dublin there really isn't any government other than the VA yeah, which I was working out there in the warehouse for a little bit, but I was just waiting until I could get my foot in the door at the base and I got it in now, so just try and enjoy that.
Gary Wise:You said you're a contractor now. Are you trying to stay with them until you retire again in the future? Are you trying to go GS?
Tavares Clover :Probably I won't go GS. The only way I'd probably go GS is if I go back to the VA. If I got a position at the VA, I'd go GS. But as far as being on the base, yeah, the contract for me is the way to go because I can get the best bang for the buck and I still get everything else through my retirement, medical, all of that stuff.
Gary Wise:Yeah, I will tell you that's probably the one thing coming out of being retired was just recognize. I remember when I did the math and I was over in Guam as the base mass chief and I just did the numbers as like what I was going to possibly get retirement plus possibly with disability, and I was just like I can make up the difference, working at home Depot, like what the heck am I doing? Like this is you know watching these department heads get like hundred thousand dollar sign-on bonuses and I'm over here stressed out all night long and I'm getting. I'm in there for the love of the game, baby.
Tavares Clover :Like oh, oh, I gotta find a new game to be in love with yeah, like you said, I think that's probably the the hardest thing for most people, that that still serve, especially, you know, when it's when they're teetering around retirement, like trying to put the numbers together and seeing if it's going to work out, because I still keep in touch with Big T. You know Big T's in Bahrain right now, so he's teetering. He's like man. I'm like you're going to be OK. Believe me, you're going to be OK.
Gary Wise:Oh, I know we talk, especially after what just went down, you know.
Tavares Clover :Exactly.
Gary Wise:The other day I saw it all happen via social media, right. I saw them say, oh, they authorized all the families to depart Bahrain and I was like, oh hell, if you know, you know, right, you know, you know. If you know, you know, yeah, hit me up off line. He's like, oh yeah, bro, it's about the sideways out here and I was, you know, but, but I also been where he's at. I'm actually writing a book right now about how do you know when to transition in life and what. What are ways to manage that transition? Because it doesn't matter whether you did your first three years in the Navy and then got out, or whether you did a 24 year career, right, ultimately, the transition is still the transition.
Tavares Clover :It is.
Gary Wise:Right, and and and. So I think a lot of us need to need. For me, I like to read books or listen to podcasts about that kind of stuff, because you never know when you might get an opportunity to level up or to evolve into something or to grow. And there's. You don't have to always reinvent the wheel, right? You should look for opportunities to learn from other people, to leverage their experience so you can make educated decisions right, take educated risks right, not ignorant risks. And there is a difference, okay. Okay, bro, as we wrap this up today, number one, I want to thank you for sharing everything, taking the time to share with us today. I'm gonna go ahead and ask you some rapid fire questions and you're gonna give me back some answers, okay?
Gary Wise:okay, all right, here we go, bro, on ship. Would you rather have pizza or wings?
Tavares Clover :Wings.
Gary Wise:All right, wings, wing got it. Okay coming up. Would you rather have had birthing cleaners or been on the worker party?
Tavares Clover :Working cleaners, I mean working party.
Gary Wise:Oh yeah, because you ran the dang worker party. Though. You run the worker party, you run the worker party. Okay, got it. Um, for actors, do you have a particular preference between de niro or pacino? Nah nah, neither one. Okay um favorite duty station throughout your career. I mean, you had atlanta, you had new orleans, you had s Orleans, you had Sassbo, you had Virginia, you had Jacksonville.
Tavares Clover :Favorite duty station Probably is Atlanta.
Gary Wise:That's a tough one to beat man.
Tavares Clover :Yeah, it's hard to beat Atlanta.
Gary Wise:All right, looking back on your career, what was your best? Liberty Port.
Tavares Clover :Best Liberty Port.
Gary Wise:Yeah, I don't know, I probably was one of those boring sailors.
Tavares Clover :So I mean I didn't drink. I don't know, I probably was one of those boring sailors. So I mean I didn't drink and didn't smoke. Probably Australia on the Ashton. Okay, yeah, that was nice, australia's a great.
Gary Wise:I'm going to live in Australia someday.
Tavares Clover :I'm not like yeah not permanently.
Gary Wise:Yeah, australia's dope. Yeah, I'll show you his dope. Okay, what was your hardest watch qualification you ever earned during your career?
Tavares Clover :Hardest watch qualification CDO.
Gary Wise:I thought he was going to say that On Ashland right, yeah, on Ashland, I remember that. Ashland right, yeah, on ashland, I remember that. Yeah, cdo on ashland, yeah, okay, all right. Um, after having done your overseas tour, looking back on your career, if you had to do a ship again, would you rather be overseas or stateside?
Tavares Clover :I'd say stateside. I'm still a stateside sailor. That's just a personal preference. I've never been one to want to be stationed overseas, but I don't regret it. I will say that yeah.
Gary Wise:You know I hated the commute. You know, when I was in San Diego driving in that 45 minutes on the freeway by Sassbo I could just walk down the street to the ship, right Commute or something else, man, and in Virginia it's terrible. Horrible, horrible. Okay, so do you have a favorite movie series?
Tavares Clover :Predator.
Gary Wise:Bro, did you see that new cartoon Predator that came out?
Tavares Clover :Yeah, yeah.
Gary Wise:Okay, yeah, okay, okay. I like that other one too. They get on hulu with that native american girl, whatever it was that's that they got a new one coming out, uh, this fall.
Tavares Clover :I just hope that they don't butcher the series, because you know this new stuff a lot of times they'll mess it up yeah, I'm also a big park fan too, me and my wife. We're going to see the new one next week.
Gary Wise:I hope it's good, bro. I hope it's good for you. I think the movie theaters have made a comeback since COVID. We went to see. What was that movie? It's one of the new Marvel movies about that team of heroes, but they're not really heroes, but they're like. Whatever it was, it was a good movie. Man, it was like that good. I forget what it was named, but it was a good movie. Okay, here we go Next up. Would you rather be independent or on a team?
Tavares Clover :Team On a team, Because I mean sports, it's a team thing, so I come from team aspects, so a team team thing. So I come from team aspects or team.
Gary Wise:OK, looking back on your life or looking forward at your future, do you have a personal, like leadership or life philosophy that you subscribe to?
Tavares Clover :Yeah, it's always flawless execution of the basics for me, like that's just, I remember that, I remember you, that's what that's what I love.
Gary Wise:Yeah, I mean, I feel like if you do the, basics, the basics.
Tavares Clover :Right, everything else will fall into place yep, I remember you telling me that.
Gary Wise:Okay, um, next up. So in the chief's mess we got deck play, leadership, institutional technical expertise, professionalism, character, loyalty, loyalty, active communication, sense of heritage. Out of those guiding principles, which one is your favorite one, and why?
Tavares Clover :Probably deck plate leadership. It's the one that I was accustomed to. I love to see, when you're leading from the front and off the deck plates, when a sailor can see that you've been through something and they can resonate to it like they they just attach to you.
Gary Wise:Yeah.
Tavares Clover :So that's. That's probably the one that I say.
Gary Wise:Hey, you know what I remember being on Ashland. That was my last ship and we would do worker parties. I would down there humping boxes with the sailors doing and they would a hundred percent parties. I would be down there humping boxes with the sailors doing it and they would 100%. They'd be like Masked Chief. What are you doing? I'm like brother, we all eating this food. Dog All hands, man All hands.
Tavares Clover :Yeah, they respect you, man, If they can see you get out there and do it instead of just barking orders and then you go off somewhere and smoke a cigarette or go off and drink some coffee, or whatever they see you getting it in. It's a newfound respect they have for you.
Gary Wise:Yeah.
Tavares Clover :Okay, brother, would you rather lead?
Gary Wise:or follow Lead. Okay yeah, why would you rather lead?
Tavares Clover :Just curious, because now, earlier in my career, I probably would have said follow. But once I put on chief, I felt like I grew into a fairly good leader, and part of that is because of deck plate leadership. You know, going through it, going through the fire and having an array of different ways to get to make chief. You know so I that's why I say that. I mean I done, I done, did a lot in my life and I feel like that I can help that next person out. Like you said, learn from somebody else's mistake. I feel like if I share my story with somebody, somebody else can possibly learn from what I did and do it a different way and do it better.
Gary Wise:So Well and it's always been my uh, my experience at the best typically don't mind following, but they typically want the leadership opportunity because they care that the team is successful and they're not afraid of taking that responsibility, putting it on their back Right, um, because it can be a lot of pressure when you're the one in the leadership position and no, I'm with it. Okay, my man, do you have any saved rounds or alibis or anything you'd like to say before we wrap this up?
Tavares Clover :no, I mean other than just thanks for the opportunity, gary. Like I said, it's uh, thanks for reaching out and we finally could get this, this done. Uh, even though we didn't serve for that long, the together, the short time that we served together. Like I said, you, you have bonds with people that you know is just can't be duplicated and I take my hat off to you, man, I'm glad you know you. I was right there when you retired. I was able to do your ID for you and your family. You know, make sure that you was. You was good to go on as that transition happened for you. So, just thanks for the opportunity, man, and, like I said, if you ever need anything, if you're ever around this way or you need anything, just hit me up. Don't hesitate to hit me up, bro.
Gary Wise:For sure, man, You're a real one dog. I've said that from the very beginning. I love you, stay connected. You do a good job of hitting me, For whatever reason. You always seem to either make a message or a comment just right on time. Man, you Big T's the same way. Y'all just do it real, y'all real thorough man, and I appreciate that.
Tavares Clover :Anytime bro.
Gary Wise:And brother. I love having blessed people in my life and I know you're blessed, bro, because I look at your three daughters. Man, you got three blessings from God. Man, and coming through everything you went through in your life to be where you're at now, man, I hope you're just as excited as I am to live the rest of our lives, because who knows what that's going to look like, right.
Tavares Clover :Yes, indeed, that's why I say you got a whole lot of living left to do, bro.
Gary Wise:A whole lot of living left to do A whole lot.
Tavares Clover :We got a lot to do, bro. Like I said, I talked to my dad. I said man, I hope I can live to see he just turned 76 this year. If I can make it that far, man, that's a blessing. I hope I can go farther. But yeah, we got a lot of living left, bro. Let's enjoy it.
Gary Wise:Yeah, and you got to stay active for those young ladies, man, because you got to. Yeah, all right team. Well, I appreciate your time, bro. Everybody keep watching for more content. Subscribe if you like this stuff and we will see y'all later.
Tavares Clover :All right brother, I appreciate you man. All right bro, out Take care.
Gary Wise:I know I was born for this. I know I was born for this. Don't care for the critics. My words and my physics are for us and they can't stop. They just don't get it. I think they forget. I'm not done till I'm on top. I know I was born for this. I know I was born for this. I know I was born for this. I believe. I believe we can write our story.
