Your most successful accomplishment

This month, my wife is celebrating 50 years of marriage with me. She married me when I was a soldier and followed me through many assignments. This lady was diagnosed with uterine cancer and had to have a hysterectomy early in our marriage before we had children. When I retired from the Army, she set up home in North Alabama where I found work for the next 25 years. When I retired-retired, she wanted to move to Arizona and I followed her this time to a place where we've never been happier. Wherever we were at, this lady made every community we lived in better. This woman's help, encouragement, and love has certainly made me a better man.

Photo taken the day before we were married.
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Later this month, I'm taking her to New York City (her choice) for our 50th. I'm making sure it's all first class for a first class lady.

So my greatest accomplishment is marrying the best and finest woman I have ever known.

God bless,
John the Blessed.
 
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The wife and I have two very accomplished daughters, both graduated college Summa Cum Laude. The oldest is a CPA whose next promotion will be to Partner in her firm, youngest daughter is a Physical Therapist who advanced to Clinic director. Two years ago she transitioned to Orthopedic sales and is currently Territory Manager. Both married great guys and have beautiful homes, youngest had two sons and the oldest will give birth to a son in early February 2025.
 
I have a pride in the relations I've had with people in my professional capacity. When I was doing title work as an attorney I consulted a lot with the local surveyors, and was able to join their professional society as an Associate member since I learned a lot about land measurements and surveys. Recently I ran into one of the surveyors I worked with a lot back in the 1980s and 1990s. Out of the clear blue sky he said how much he enjoyed working with me and a lady attorney I had taught about land descriptions because we understood a lot about the work he did.

Part of my duties on my final job was collection work. I would go to the minor courts to interview judgment debtors about their assets and income to see if it was feasible to pursue collection efforts on the judgments against them. This meant the judgment debtors had to come to court and be prepared to go under oath and answer a lot of questions from the representative (me) for the creditor. From being laid off in the recent past I had some empathy for the debtors, and I came to the conclusion that these people weren't going to pay any faster if I treated them like dirt. Yes, I had a job to do, but I decided right from the start that I was going to treat the debtors with dignity and respect. I was very proud that a bunch of the judgment debtors thanked me for making the process a lot easier than they thought it was going to be.
 
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Life is like a river for the most part, and if you do the right thing - honor and love your parents, find a loving spouse and and have a good family life together, a successful work career - all the expected things a good person and good citizen does, then it flows smoothly for the most part and the trip is a good one. I guess that's me for the most part, but here and there along my 81 years some small things stand out that I'm proud of.

Here's one:
I got to be an expert on some very high speed, multimillion dollar packaging machines, and from time to time got calls to go to our factories to help with a problem.
On one of these, I met Calvin, a mechanic I knew from other times in the factory. He was thirtyish, eager to learn and a natural mechanic. He was stumped on a section of the machine, and I handed him some feeler gages and said "This section has to be dead parallel, with the rollers at 0.5 mm +0.1/-0.0 apart. He fanned out the gauges, said "This one?" It was 0.7. "No, 0.5" He fanned again said "This one?" It was 0.3. I looked at him for a moment and asked "Calvin, can you read?"
Sheepishly - "No."
Incredulous, I asked "How did you get through the mechanics' school on this machine?"
The manuals were thick, and candidates had to successfully perform many delicate setting tasks on the machine to graduate. He told me he took the manual home, had his wife read it to him, and he memorized it. I knew he a had a good work ethic, but this stunned me. If he couldn't do the work on his own, he'd lose his job as a mechanic and get cut back to a lesser paying job.

I walked him off the floor to employee assistance, and enrolled him in a reading program. This was totally confidential - only the counsellor, I and Calvin knew. Shortly thereafter, I got transferred to another facility in another city.

Two years later, I happened to be back in the factory, and ran into Calvin in a hallway. We shook hands, exchanged greetings and he said, beaming,

"I want to thank you. I can read."

Thanks to my job, I saw a dozen or so countries, got some patents, got to be an expert on something, led some priority one corporate projects and made a decent living, but getting Calvin to read was the best thing I did in my career.
 
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Greatest achievement ? ... Children? - Nope (none that I'm aware of). Successful marriage of many years? - Nope (too many divorces). Great career - Nope (OK, but nothing special). Maybe that handgun grip thing ....... OR ....... Hold it .... I've got it !! Staying out of jail :) .... Well, .... except for that 2 hour stint until my buddy showed up with bail money back in '69. According to where my elementary school principal told my parents I would end up :( ..... Staying out of jail is definitely my greatest achievement! :)
 
No kids, so I guess it would have to be my career. I became recognized as an expert in my field, doing a lot of interesting stuff, with travel to some odd places in some unusual airplanes.
 
375hh1973 said:
And once I saw a blimp.
Click to expand...

Several years ago, The Ohio State football team played Notre Dame for only the third time. It was such a big deal that Goodyear sent the entire fleet of 4 blimps top provide top coverage of the game. They came in over my property from the Northwest at 500 feet in altitude, in a WWI Zeplin bombing formation! After the game they scattered to the wind, except one went about 5 miles North of my house and practiced "Proposing", (just going up and down) for an hour plus!

I consider this one of the greatest aviation days of my life!

(On 9/11/01, I saw Air Force One, with a two-fighter escort, flying back to Washington DC! The Strength and Hope it instilled in my heart make that moment my #1 Aviation Moment)

Ivan
 
Soon celebrating 33 years of marriage to my wife. 2nd marriage for us both, but this one has been good. Neither of us had kids from the first marriages, but in this one we have 2 sons - a drug dealer and a mercenary. Actually, older one is a pharmacist and the other an Army officer. We raised them "old school" and make no apologies for that. They are god-fearing conservatives, who believe in our Constitution. The oldest is married to a wonderful woman and has 2 sons now. The younger son just needs to find the right woman.
 
Changes over time:
In my childhood, surviving the nuns beatings/ Catholic school.
In my 20's, finishing college, moving to Florida, building EPCOT, well the concrete anyways.
In my 30's marrying an RN and settling down. Dumped her and married a 23 y/o that gave me a son but almost destroyed my life on her way out.
In my 40's settled down again, rebuilt my life, became a pharma rep and grabbed that money with both hands. Made "President's Club" (top 1% of sales) in 2004 lasted into my early 50's.
In my 50's married #3, settled down again, transitioned from pharma money to teacher money. Learned it is much easier to go from $35,000/yr to $100,000/yr than to go from $100K back to $35K, surviving being a great accomplishment.
In my 60's traveled around with the wife, welcomed grandchildren, paid off everything, retired.
Too early to tell about 70's. At 70 (Aug 2023) made it to the top of the Manitou Incline (I'm the one dying in the pic, wife is 10 yrs younger, just grinning). It tried to kill me but my son moved back to Denver so I don't need to pass it and wonder: "Could I still...."
I'll let you know how it turns out in 2033, unless the worms get me 1st. Joe
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Yes, I went to a Catholic school one year and they do beat the snot out of you with a stick or ruler. lol
 
My cousin went to Catholic school.. He got beat with a stick one time. Took the stick away from the nun. broke it. Never got beat again...but he really wasn't a trouble maker...He never said what happened after. I got in trouble at school once smoking in the basement. Principal was gonna beat me with a paddle. I told him..You might beat me but I'm gonna fight you. My mother can hit me and so can my father if I deserve it...but I will fight you if you do it. Took me out of study hall and copy the(BIG)book of Military Courts Marshals for a couple months. He was a WWII Marine LT Colonel. Guess he had never had someone say that to him. I was still punished but in a different way
 
I can think of one. Back about 1995 I went on a "Murder Mystery Cruise" with my girlfriend and future ex-wife. Teams broken up by maybe a dozen tables. Good dinner, and even a better actors.

I took notes thru the whole play, and pretty clearly figured it out. Guy at my table had a different solution and was pretty pushy for it. I just said to the table "do what you want, but if you want to win.....

At the last second, the "Team Captain" submitted my solution, and our team subsequently solved the murder. I got a standing ovation from all the teams, and lucky with the future ex that night, so proud of me she was..

In 30 years of law enforcement, that NEVER happened to me when I solved a REAL crime...:(

Larry
 
The only one that will matter in the end is my relationship with Christ.

As to what accomplishments I had over my career, I wish I could say. This pretty much sums it up:

"For it is the lot of some men to be assigned duties about which they may not speak. Such work is not for every man. But those who accept the burdens implicit in this silent labor realize a camaraderie and sense of value known to few. These memories cannot be stolen. They will last always, untarnished, ever better." - Col. Larry McClain
 
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Was a Duncan yoyo champ, when I was 9, in '56.
Taught me how to deal with life's ups and downs.
Had a quartet in '61, that played the long term care children's hospitals, in NYC.
Bought the kids, lotsa toys, with the money we were given.
 
Started out kind of sideways growing up on the streets of Detroit but because of my faith that my mother instilled in me, I straightened out, matured and found my perfect soul mate. My wife and family is my biggest accomplishment.
I have been blessed in many ways.
 
Collecting a $50 wager from 2 nice young ladies who bet i wouldn't live to see my 21st birthday. Then staying on past my expiration date from when kidneys/heart were failing.
 
Some great ones to remember:
Marrying my wife off 44 years. The second for us both.
Getting into the Coast Guard when it was nearly impossible.
Being promoted to the rank of Chief Warrant Officer W2 and retiring at that rank.
Paying off our mortgage January 1 of 2024.
Living 50 years beyond the 25 years everyone said I'd be dang lucky to see.
Did I mention marrying my second wife who has put up with me for the past 44 years.
Staying out of jail where my Aunt Jeannie said I'd die.
But the greatest will be when it's time to drive my last mile and St. Peter says, "Come on in Llance, the Boss has been waiting for you.

Llance
 
Going on 33 years of marriage to the person I'd rather be around than anyone else. Helping raise 4 now adult children who have never been in trouble with the law or gotten into drugs, giving us soon to be 6 grandchildren. Everything else is icing on the cake.
 
Learning my job and then my supervisors civil engineering job, and then doing my supervisors job during a company emergency for over a year while I was still a probationary hire, without any formal education in the field.
 
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