​In January 1999, Dale Stewart called me and asked if I could help on a project at the Arizona Science Center in downtown Phoenix. Many of you know Dale, he owns the Arizona Hiking Shack in Phoenix. The IMAX movie "Everest" was coming to the Science Center and not just the movie, David Breashears was going to be there in person. I never knew much about David, but I was amazed on how this guy didn't just climb up Everest, he lugged up a ton of huge cameras and massive film reels to capture his Everest creation. I instantly respected David Breashears, and was excited that I was part of the fun.

Dale and I were instructed to create two climbing routes on the outside second floor wall of the Science Center. It was no big deal since it was a 20' low angle slab and a cake job. Hammer-drilling rock always makes me feel powerful like "Rambo." We installed about one hundred drop set anchors, installed Chris Raypole's Climbing Dynamics Holds to them, and created two easy climbing routes for people who wanted to try climbing during the "Everest" event. Dale and I noticed that we had a few extra days before the event started, so we talked to the coordinator at the Science Center and mentioned that we could dress the show up a bit. Dale has the climbing store, Marty has the climbing connections. We decided to create a climbing scene and display in the main lobby in front of the IMAX theater.

I am not a big ice gear collector so I had to reach out to people to find some cool display items. I heard about this guy that lives in Prescott Arizona, which is only 1 1/2 hours away from Phoenix. This guy is a disabled climber named Tom Whittaker, who made the first one legged/disabled ascent of Everest. No he didn't just use one leg to climb the mountain, he had a prosthetic lower leg section that had different crampon parts that he could attach to it. So I drove to Prescott to meet this legend. Tom and I instantly hit it off as he served me crumpets and tea and we shared laughs. He didn't just let me borrow some of his gear, we were able to have him give slide show presentations to the visitors, and talks of his Everest ascent at the Science Center. This was turning out pretty cool!

I had Tom's prosthetic leg in the display, summit oxygen tank and many more items of interest. I called climbers in town and borrowed gear from Bill Dacier, Tim Penner, Wally Vegors, Brett Bigelow, along with some Karabin items as well. The display turned out fantastic! Dale went overboard with a full basecamp display with manikins on portaledges and more. It was classic since the Science Center only asked for a simple two route attraction. Tom Whittaker's story was beyond touching, and easily drew a tear to many. Tom you are totally an amazing inspirational person! It finally came the time for the showing of the Everest movie, and I was excited to finally meet David Breashears.

David gave a short speech before the movie started, and then disappeared. The Everest movie was incredible! What an amazing job he did filming this beautiful, but at many times, vicious peak. After the movie I searched around for David and he was nowhere. I asked "Where did he go?" I was told that he was on a very tight schedule so I was left standing there with the Everest movie poster unsigned, all alone and bummed. Suddenly I saw him and stopped him as he walked by with his entourage. He said "Wonderful Display", signed my poster and walked away all within 45 seconds. I stared calmly at this legend as he disappeared from my sight, but I knew that he was just too busy to see me. Not a big deal! The whole Everest Festival that Dale/Marty/Tom/Science Center created was the best!

A few years later my divorce happened. I had nowhere to go but a small apartment that my kids and I made the best of. Somehow we crammed everything in our life into a few hundred square feet. I was able to get a job at the Phoenix Rock Gym, which I am very grateful to Paul Diefenderfer for since nobody else was hiring at the

time. Life was tough, but I remained chin-up in my faith and knew all was going to be okay. In December 2002, I received a phone call from Kathi Reichert who was working for the City of Phoenix Parks Department at the time. She asked me if I could create a display for an upcoming event at the Phoenician Resort in Phoenix. Kathi had a simple table top plastic display cube to for the display, which would be placed outside the main room of the event. I agreed to create it and found this display to be another cake volunteer job.
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I asked Kathi what the event was about, and it turned out to be a $50 per seat major charitable event on December 12, called "Everest: Mountain Without Mercy,'" and the main speaker was David Breashears. Cool! I was real busy at the time juggling work, thinking about the display, getting used to this new child support idea, and Christmas was just two weeks away. I decided that I could put together the display on the fly, and could gather the gear from my apartments crammed closets the night before the Event. I arrived home at 5:00 that night and there was a small puddle outside my front door. I lifted my eyebrows in amazement of the mystery. The front of my apartment has many tall windows and I was located on the first floor, in a cozy corner of the complex. On the outside, the windows were completely dry, but on the inside of the windows, it looked like a lawn sprinkler was spraying everywhere as water rolled down them. 
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I hastily opened my front door and felt a swoosh of heat hit me in my face as I stared at my apartment being flooded by very hot water. It felt like it was 160 degrees in there and visually I could see 2 1/2 to 3 inches of water pooled up on my apartment floor. Luckily I didn't just run into the apartment since I noticed on my bookcase that all of my Chouinard catalogs and many historic books were on the bottom shelf, and the water was within 1/8 inch of destroying them. I tipped toed in like the tooth fairy. I mean, I was not even breathing as I slowly reached the catalogs to save them. As I stared at the floating presents around the Christmas tree, I called the apartment manager and insisted that he has two seconds to get to my apartment before I kick in the door of the unoccupied apartment, which was two doors down from me.
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We discovered that a hot water pipe, which was the main pipe for the entire complex, had ruptured under my bathroom floor, and the pressure of it having nowhere to go forced the hot water into my apartment. Every wall, picture, cabinets inside and out was dripping down with water from the hot water mist. Myself and the apartment manager moved almost everything I had until 4:00 in the morning to save whatever I could from being ruined. Keep in mind, we were not just moving a few couches, you also had hundreds of catalogs, thousands of pieces of gear and the moving seemed like it was never going to end. No folks, no tears from Marty! This was response time not remorse time! I didn't even say one swear word, and I don't think I even said one word to the apartment manager while the moving process was happening. Oh yeah, I still have to get display items together for the big Everest event which was starting in just a few hours.

By 8:00 in the morning I met Kathy over at the Phoenician Resort and began setting up the display. I was beyond spent and felt like I had climbed Everest solo in one push. My calves were killing me and the blisters on my feet from my soaked tennis shoes were wide open. David Breashears came up from behind me to see the display I was creating. He mentioned to me that he wanted me to be present at the event. I started to tell David that there was "NO WAY, YOU DON'T EVEN UNDERSTAND," and he cut my explanation off insisting that I go home, get cleaned up, and be back here within two hours. "Lord, does this ever end?" When I arrived home, two guys were jackhammering the floor of my apartment and had a 4 foot pile of dirt in my hallway. The entire complex water supply was shut 

down. From the jackhammering, I noticed the mud splats that covered the walls of my apartment all over all of my signed superstar pictures that I had hung throughout. I had no more time, but had to use hand wipes to bathe, remember there was no water, and find something to wear and get back to the resort for the start of the event.
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Since it was Christmas time, I figured the colorful Christmas sweater would work okay since everything else I had was in a great pile. Man my energy was gone as I walked up to the Phoenician Resort wondering why I even was there. Just outside the doors of the great room, David met me and said that I was just in time. He told me to follow him and then he escorted me into the room. I immediately felt like I was out of place as I noticed over 200 people all wearing black and white suits and tuxedos. The women were even dressed to code. My colorful Christmas sweater sure stood out!!!!!! I saw that Paul Diefenderfer my boss was there in the back of the room, and my Xwifes company owner Preston McMurray was there in the crowd also.
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So 200 or so of these people were owners of the biggest companies in Arizona. Gulp, but I followed David where he escorted me down the center isle between all of the people sitting at the many tables, to the very front table of the room. I sat down feeling so out of place and knew nobody, then David walked up on stage and gave a beautiful presentation about himself. At my table was the president of APS, president of Motorola, and so many other huge people that were looking at me and not talking to me. Before the presentation was over, David made an announcement, had me come up on stage, and said to the crowd how much he appreciated everything I had done for him every time he came to Arizona. He gave me a big hug in front of the clapping crowd where my hug back to him almost crushed him. Once his speech was finished, he sat next to me for the lunch/dinner.

I assume there was an extra seat reserved in case David brought somebody with him to the event. It was at this time that I truly recognized that there definitely is a God. Think about it! Everybody paid to be there, I did not. Everybody was an owner or was associated with companies worth over one million dollars, and I had nothing and was in the process of just about losing everything. Everybody was dressed beautifully, and I still was wearing wet tennis shoes and was wearing a LOUD colorful sweater that stood out like a beacon. I became the honored guest where David was the speaker, and then he sat beside me, and I ate lunch/dinner with him. That was a huge moment in my life!

David, I am so grateful for meeting you the way it unfolded. You are an amazing speaker and your climbing talents will be well noted in the history books. Thank you for enhancing my life beyond anything I thought possible!