This past weekend, I went down to Charlotte to see my family. Originally, that wasn’t the plan, but my mom called me earlier in the week and told me my grandfather would be spending the weekend with them. What was I going to do? Say no? Absolutely not.
I arrived in Charlotte on Thursday evening at about 6:30 P.M. I had told my mom that I was going to arrive Friday afternoon, but I decided to surprise my parents. They were extremely surprised to see me walking in the front door with my dog and my bags. It took them a few seconds to realize it was me. We hung out for a few hours, had dinner, and then they went to bed. It wasn’t so great for me in the end because I forgot to do my 6 tweets for my Social Media Marketing class for the week, so, whoops.
I woke up the next morning at about 10, and within 30 seconds my dad comes in and says that he can’t pick up my grandfather at the airport and that I had to do it. Okay, no problem. For those of you who don’t know, my grandfather is one of my favorite people in the world, if not the most. It’s not only that he’s extremely nice, patient, and very caring, it’s also that I have nothing but the utmost respect for him. He has quite an interesting story.
My grandfather was born and raised on a farm in Eldon, Iowa. It is a very small town. In 2010, the population was 927, just to give you a frame of reference. His mom passed when he was 6, and he cared for her very much. She was very sweet and taught him some very important lessons. Every day he would wake up at 5-6 A.M., take care of the farm until about 11 P.M., and would continue the cycle day in day out. In high school, he met a girl who became my grandmother. They stayed married until she passed about 12 years ago. They were together for a very, very long time. There is a lot to his life, and I don’t want to have to put you through reading 10 pages worth of material, so I’ll cut to the chase. He went into the US Air Force and became a lieutenant, and fought in the Korean war. After leaving the Air Force, he went into the life insurance business and started working for Penn Mutual. Now he is 85 years old, and still works for them. He serves as their executive consultant. Basically, he goes from agency to agency telling them how to become more efficient and how to improve. He travels usually 3-5 days a week. Just last week, one of his work days went from 6 AM until 9 PM. How many people even in their 40s do that?
He is a large reason why I’m going into the life insurance industry when I graduate. I couldn’t be more excited. I’ll be working in the same place I worked this summer. Everybody that I’ve met that works in the industry is extremely nice because they all are in it for the same reason: to help people. Anyone who goes into life insurance for any other reason doesn’t last. That’s a fact. Anyways, I’m getting off topic.
I had an incredible weekend with my family, and seeing my grandfather made it all that much better. He is my role model.
cpoore10 