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From Surviving to Thriving: An Interview with Author Tom Madigan (Part One) · Hangin' Out with Bob

0:07
OK, welcome to “Hangin’ Out with Bob,” a podcast
0:10
hosted by me, Bob Edholm. Thanks for joining
0:16
us and let's get started. Well, I'm really looking
0:21
forward to this podcast. My guest today is Tom
0:24
Madigan, a friend of mine since the mid-1970s.
0:27
He's been a guest on this podcast at least a
0:30
few other times. He joins me today in the palatial
0:33
recording studio of my apartment in Columbia
0:35
Heights, Minnesota. Tom is currently living in
0:40
the Twin Cities suburb of Blaine, Minnesota, when
0:43
the weather isn't, well, when it isn't winter
0:45
time. He spends at least the other six months
0:48
in a day in Gold Canyon, Arizona, in the greater
0:50
Phoenix area. And if you’ll recall during our previous
0:54
podcasts with him, I often addressed Tom by his
0:56
nickname, Dog. So, Dog, welcome back to “Hangin’
0:59
out with Bob.” Thanks for having me, look forward
1:05
to conversation today. All right, just a quick
1:08
bio here for Tom Madigan He recently became a
1:11
member of the Septuagenarian Club. In other words,
1:14
he turned 70. Welcome to the club, Dog. Oh, yeah,
1:17
I'm thrilled. Tom grew up in Waseca, Minnesota
1:23
about a 90-mile drive due south of his Minnesota
1:26
residence in Blaine He's currently retired, but
1:29
he was a civil engineer for decades. He earned
1:32
his degree in civil engineering from the University
1:35
of Minnesota, and he also earned a master's degree
1:41
in business administration from the University
1:43
of St. Thomas. He was such a successful and respected
1:52
project manager, in fact, that after he retired,
1:55
he even taught a course in project management
1:58
through the University of New Mexico, home of
2:00
the Lobos, where everyone's a Lobo. “Everyone's
2:04
a Lobo! Woof! Woof! Woof!” And how many years
2:07
did you teach that course in project management,
2:09
Professor Madigan? Eight years. Wow. Okay. Okay.
2:13
Now, besides being a civil engineer, project
2:17
manager, and professor, as well as a husband,
2:20
father, and grandfather, and still a pretty decent
2:22
golfer, we can add another title to Tom Madigan's
2:25
name, published author. That's right. At the
2:32
beginning of 2026, Mr. Madigan here had his first
2:36
book published. It's a memoir entitled “I Survived:
2:39
Living with the Trauma of a Dependent Parent,”
2:42
by Thomas Madigan. It's been issued by Page Publishing.
2:46
That's Page—P-A-G-E—Publishing. So, before
2:50
we even start discussing your book, Dog, let
2:52
me just say, “Congratulations.” Thanks, Bob. It's
2:55
been quite a journey. Now, I know our podcast
2:58
is audio only, but I want to describe, or try to
3:01
describe, the front cover of your book, Okay? Near
3:04
the top of the front cover, in big, white capital
3:06
Letters, it says, “I Survived,” and in smaller letters,
3:10
right below that, it says, “Living with the Trauma
3:12
of a Dependent Parent.” And across the bottom of
3:15
the front cover, all in white caps, it says, “Thomas
3:18
Madigan.” Okay, but what really captures your eye
3:21
on this cover is the photo of Tom as a toddler.
3:24
It's in color, or at least colorized, and against
3:28
a soft green backdrop, and sitting on a light,
3:31
Brown-colored floor, there's young Tom Madigan,
3:35
sitting up straight and smiling at somebody to
3:37
his left of the camera. He's wearing a long-sleeve,
3:41
multi -tonal brown, cotton-flannel shirt with
3:44
a bold, plaid pattern. The shirt is tucked into
3:47
what looks like some very durable corduroy trousers,
3:51
typical of mid-fifties children's playwear.
3:53
And, of course, white socks and brown, high-top
3:57
Buster Brown-like shoes. And what really cracks
3:59
me up though, because it was so common at the
4:02
time, those corduroy pants, they're rolled up
4:05
at the cuffs, revealing a plaid lining that matches
4:08
the pattern of the flannel shirt. So typical
4:10
of that time, right? They were insulated. I was
4:13
going to say, was this taken in the summer? That
4:16
shirt, like 20 below and you just stayed warm.
4:19
It probably was. Anyway, he looks like a good
4:22
little boy in this photo. It's a cute shot. And
4:24
let me also describe for a moment the back cover
4:26
of Tom's book. It's the blurb. And the purpose
4:29
of the blurb, of course, is to summarize the
4:31
book's content and entice us readers to buy it
4:33
and read it. And in the upper left corner of
4:35
that blurb is a photo, a bit larger than the
4:38
size of a postage stamp of Tom today. Not wearing
4:41
a cotton-flannel, plaid shirt, either, on that photo,
4:44
are you? Yeah, I took that picture in Arizona.
4:47
Yeah, you even need that flannel shirt in Gold
4:50
Canyon, which is so... This will be a two-part
4:55
podcast. We have lots of good material to discuss
4:58
in Tom's book. Here, in Part One, we'll cover
5:02
chapters 1, 2, and 3. In Part Two, we'll
5:06
go over chapters 4 through 8. Alright,
5:09
so without further ado, Dog, let's discuss your
5:12
book. Again, it's called “I Survived: Living with
5:15
the Trauma of a Dependent Parent.” Sounds good.
5:20
First of all, Dog, why did you write the book?
5:22
What was your motivation or inspiration? Well,
5:25
you know, growing up with an alcoholic father,
5:28
it was some tough times. And my sister moved
5:31
out of the house when she was 17. I was 11, so
5:34
she's six-and-a-half years older than me. And
5:36
my mom and I used to kid each other that if somebody
5:40
wrote a book about this, no one would believe
5:41
what we were going through. And on my mom's deathbed,
5:45
she died in 1991 of ovarian cancer, I told her,
5:49
I said, “Someday, Mom, I'm going to write a book
5:51
about this.” And it took me 34 years to get around
5:55
to writing it. I had to wait and, really, for my
5:58
sister to pass away because I have a whole chapter
6:00
in the book about my sister. I ended up finally
6:04
getting it done. So I'm very proud of that and
6:06
I fulfilled a promise I made to my mother. Do
6:09
me a favor, Dog. If you could, I'd like to have
6:11
you just read that dedication because I think
6:13
it was really nice the way you presented it.
6:15
It's the first thing you'll read when you turn,
6:17
you know, the front page and start. “Mom and I
6:20
joked that no one would believe what we experienced
6:22
if we wrote a book about it. When Mom was dying
6:25
in her nursing home bed, I promised her that
6:27
someday I would write the book. Thirty-four years later,
6:31
I've kept that promise. Yeah, and that you did.
6:33
That was great. Better late than never. How long
6:36
did it take you to actually write the book from
6:37
the time you first said, “I'm going to do it?”
6:40
And then you were down in Arizona, I take it?
6:43
Yes, that's correct. I actually started to, kind
6:45
of the concept of it, in Santa Fe, New Mexico.
6:48
Oh, right. And then I wrote it actually, like
6:51
you said, in Gold Canyon. Okay, Okay. So I did about
6:55
a month's worth of research, online and in libraries,
7:00
that kind of thing, looking into kind of the
7:03
origins and the causation of alcoholism. So I
7:06
did a lot of research. The first chapter of the
7:08
book is based on those investigations that I
7:11
completed. It's not a thorough investigation,
7:14
obviously, but I think it gives people a sense
7:16
Of, kind of what causes people to drink. And the
7:21
actual writing of the book only took me about
7:23
a week. Wow. Yeah, I wrote it probably seven hours
7:27
a day for an entire week. And I'm talking an
7:30
entire week, seven days. Yeah. Wow. Interesting.
7:33
Okay. We mentioned earlier that you grew up in
7:38
Waseca, Minnesota. Again, that's about 90 miles
7:40
from your current residence in Blaine. What was
7:43
it like growing up there in Waseca? Well, at
7:45
the time I grew up there, it was about a town
7:47
of about five thousand. You know, you could ride
7:51
your bike everywhere, play outside all the time.
7:54
I spent a lot of time playing sports as a kid.
7:56
I played a lot of baseball in the summers. I
7:58
played touch football in the wintertime. It
8:01
was a good place to grow up. I grew up in town.
8:04
My dad was a railroad engineer for Chicago Northwestern.
8:07
My mom was a working mom at home. So I pretty
8:12
much had free reign. I had good friends in the
8:14
neighborhood that I could hang out with and do
8:15
stuff with. We had enough kids in raging age
8:19
that we could put two nine-man baseball teams
8:22
together. And I grew up just a few blocks from
8:25
the University of Minnesota-Waseca campus at
8:27
that time. It's a prison now, medium security
8:29
prison. I think it's for women now, if I'm not
8:33
mistaken. But I grew up just a few blocks from
8:36
that and we had all the fields and access to
8:38
those fields for us. So we played a lot of ball
8:41
over on those fields. Nice. Again, and your discussion
8:45
of alcoholism, that's the first chapter of the
8:47
book. It's just entitled “Alcoholism.” What probably
8:50
was the most surprising things that you learned
8:53
as you were doing your research? What didn't
8:55
you realize or hadn't occurred to you? I think
8:59
the thing, and I talk about that in one of the
9:02
other chapters of the woman I met on the plane,
9:04
who was an alcoholic, kind of enlightened me
9:07
of the fact that the dependency and the need
9:10
for sugar, it's ethanol, obviously, is what's
9:14
driving it within booze itself. But it's their
9:18
craving of sugar that keeps driving them. And
9:20
it's a biological need. And they just keep wanting
9:25
to fulfill that. And they don't ever get enough
9:28
of it. So that dopamine “high” they get from the
9:31
sugar. They keep wanting more and more of it.
9:34
And that's what causes them to become an alcoholic.
9:37
And obviously not everybody becomes an alcoholic.
9:39
Some people are just predisposed toward it, then?
9:42
Yeah, there's some genetics there that causes
9:46
that. There's also circumstances of emotional
9:50
things, psychological things that occur with
9:52
people as well that are triggers. But it is a
9:55
biological thing that causes it. There are certain
9:58
enzymes that people have that other people don't
10:03
have as strong an enzyme demand and that results
10:07
in them craving that sugar, that ethanol. Wow.
10:11
So it was probably pretty enlightening to read
10:13
all that stuff. It is. It was surprising to me,
10:17
you know, learning about it and understanding
10:19
it. And like I said, the woman I met on the plane
10:22
that was an alcoholic, you know, she said, you
10:24
know, that was her demand. And even when she
10:27
wasn't drinking, and it was true for my dad too.
10:30
He had a huge sugar tooth. Okay, he likes sweets.
10:33
Oh, yeah. Yeah, absolutely. Absolutely. Yeah,
10:35
he’d chew on hard candy or, you know, he loved cookies
10:39
and, you know, it that was always there and she
10:42
said that, too, as an alcoholic, she said, “I, I just
10:45
always had the, the craving for sugar.” Wow. Okay,
10:51
Well, after, in chapter 1, you kind of “zoomed
10:54
Out” and you gave us kind of an overview of some
10:56
of the causes of alcoholism. And then in chapter
10:58
2, which is called “Family History,” then you
11:01
“zoom in,” and you actually talk about your family.
11:04
You mentioned them briefly, but just tell us
11:05
a little bit more about your mom and dad, you
11:08
know, where they were from, where they grew up,
11:11
how they ended up in Waseca and that kind of
11:13
stuff. Well, I actually, uh, grew up in a house
11:15
that my dad built that was a lot that my grandmother
11:19
owned, my dad's mother. She sold that lot to
11:22
us, and we built a house on it in 1956, the year I was
11:26
born. And so I moved in. I'd lived next door
11:29
to my grandmother. Got along really well with
11:32
her. She was a tough Norwegian, full -blooded
11:34
Norwegian. Lost her husband, and that's part
11:38
of the book as well, in 1928. My dad was three (years old)
11:43
when he lost his dad. He had a big family too,
11:45
right? And he was the baby of the family? Yeah,
11:46
he was a baby. There was six of them. Roy was
11:50
the oldest. And then there was Sam, Warren, Margaret,
11:55
Irene, and then my dad. How much age difference
11:57
between your dad, the youngest, and the oldest
11:58
brother? I think Roy was 16 when my dad was born.
12:05
Age gap between the oldest and the youngest.
12:07
So my dad, like I said, he grew up without really
12:11
knowing his dad. I mean, obviously his dad was
12:13
alive when he was three (years old), but he didn't really
12:15
know his dad. And how much of that triggered
12:17
him in terms of not having a relationship. He
12:21
was really close to his brother, Sam, which, his
12:23
real name is John, but everybody called him Sam.
12:26
And Sam was killed in a car accident in Germany
12:29
after the war. And they were really close. And
12:33
I wonder also if Sam would have been alive, how
12:37
much that would have helped my dad in dealing
12:39
with some of his issues in his life and moving
12:43
forward. So my mom grew up in Janesville, Minnesota,
12:47
which is about 10-11 miles west of Waseca on
12:51
US Highway 14. and she grew up with a really
12:55
good household. Her dad was a farmer, also a
13:00
John Deere implement dealer. He and his brother,
13:02
Ed, my grandfather's name was Herman, had a John
13:06
Deere implement dealership in Janesville, and
13:09
they owned at different times. My grandfather
13:12
did four farms around, you know, the Waseca area. He mostly
13:19
rented it out when I knew of it, when I was older.
13:23
But I think at some point he actually farmed
13:25
that land. He had a farm that was on Lake Elysian.
13:29
He had 700 feet of lake frontage on Lake Elysian.
13:32
I used to go there as a kid, go fishing, cane
13:38
pole, and fishing for bullheads in the spring,
13:41
and panfish. And my grandmother was just the
13:45
sweetest person in the world. I loved her. They
13:48
were both full-blooded Germans. My mother was
13:50
a full-blooded German. And just what my grandmother
13:53
used to talk German to me, and I'd look at her
13:55
like, “Grandma, what are you saying to me?” And
13:57
I took German in high school, but it didn't help
14:00
much. But anyway, it was fun. They were good
14:03
people. So my mom had a really, I think, a really
14:06
good childhood, I think. And she had an older
14:08
sister, Anita, who was a couple of years older.
14:10
And they both had good childhoods. Yeah. I think
14:14
you did a great job of describing your family
14:16
history. Were you able to do that mostly from
14:17
memory or did you do any other research or genealogical?
14:21
I did some genealogical work. You talk about
14:23
great-grandparents from Ireland that came in
14:26
on your dad's side. Yeah, I did. I actually joined
14:28
the Irish Genealogical Society here in the Twin
14:31
Cities. Okay. And I used to go to the Irish Fest.
14:34
I don't know if I'll go this year or not, but
14:36
I've been going to the Irish Fest, and they had
14:38
a sign-up where I could, you know, join the genealogical
14:41
society, and I did that. So I went down and they
14:43
had access to, you know, 23andMe. Now, I guess it
14:46
was, what's the other one? 23andMe. Oh. The other,
14:51
I'm drawing a blank. What is it? It's the DNA.
14:56
Oh, not Legacy. No, no. You send your sample
15:02
in and they... Oh, okay. Anyway, they had access
15:06
to all the information in there. So I did the
15:08
research on the family and I've included death
15:11
certificates in the book around my dad's death
15:15
certificate, my grandfather's death certificate,
15:17
and my great-grandmother's. My grandfather's
15:21
mother's death certificate, and my great-great
15:23
-grandmother's death certificate. Yeah, back
15:26
of the book, right? Yeah, back of the book. Yeah.
15:29
And my great-grandmother, we're pretty well
15:32
convinced, was an alcoholic as well. My Aunt
15:36
Irene, my dad's sister, talked about the fact
15:40
that she died of alcoholism. Her death certificate
15:43
identifies her having died of liver cancer. Well,
15:46
if you research that, that's usually a telltale
15:50
sign of somebody that's had a drinking (problem), right?
15:53
There's not always a case, obviously, but there's
15:55
a pretty good percentage chance that they were
15:58
an alcoholic. So it kind of bears out what the
16:01
family had indicated about, you know, Great-Grandmother,
16:03
that she came over from Ireland and, you know,
16:07
ended up in the Upper Midwest, married her husband in
16:12
Owatonna. Okay, sure. I actually went out to the
16:17
Catholic cemetery. My side of the family, the
16:21
Madigan family is Irish, obviously, coming from
16:23
Ireland. So I went out there and a lot of the
16:28
graves are out there. My great-great -grandmother's
16:30
grave is out there, and my grandmother. So, you
16:32
know, I went out there, did research, you know,
16:35
to find the graves, and I actually did a little
16:37
cleanup around the graves, actually, when I was
16:39
there. They were in pretty bad shape, but it
16:41
was nice to be able to experience that. I did
16:43
that last summer. Nice. Oh, that's good. That's
16:46
good. What did you find the most interesting,
16:49
the most surprising, most disturbing in your
16:51
family research? What kinds of things did you
16:54
go, “Wow, I had no idea”? I was surprised that
16:59
there's not a lot of information. That would
17:02
really surprise me is that there was a fire at
17:05
one of the churches. We're from the Cork, Ireland,
17:08
area. Oh yeah, Cork. Limerick, Cork. And there
17:12
was a fire, burned a lot of the records, so I
17:14
was not able to get... Ancestry, that's what
17:17
I was trying to think of. Oh, okay, okay, okay.
17:19
The brain is not, you know, I'm 70, it doesn't
17:22
work as fast as it used to. Anyway, there was
17:28
not a lot of research. I kind of ran up against
17:30
it when I got to my great-great grandmother.
17:33
and grandfather. In fact, there's very little
17:35
information about my great-great grandfather.
17:39
I think you still uncovered a lot though. I did.
17:41
I was able to get a lot of information about
17:43
it. I'm sure there's a history of alcoholism
17:49
that I couldn't uncover in the family. It's Ireland.
17:54
Nothing that you're aware of, though, on your mother's
17:56
side though? No, not at all. Not at all. The
18:02
woman that I met on the plane that I talk about
18:04
in the book, she talked about that. She said,
18:06
you know, your DNA from your mother broke you
18:09
from having it. You have different genes, different
18:13
DNA, and as a result of your mother, you did
18:18
not get the disease. Interesting. Now, it's interesting
18:23
also because when my sister passed away, the pastor
18:28
that was with her to make the decision. She had
18:31
a massive heart attack three years ago. Four
18:35
years ago now, I guess. Yeah, four years ago.
18:37
And was at Abbott Northwestern Hospital in Minneapolis
18:40
and had called in a pastor to come in and be
18:43
with her and I guess to really decide to turn
18:45
the machines off and to let her go because her
18:49
heart was basically shredded, according to the
18:50
pastor. And I talk about this in a book, Bob.
18:54
I didn't really have much relationship with my
18:56
sister for… as an adult. She was a very bitter,
19:01
angry person. Dad was not real nice to her emotionally,
19:06
not so much physically, although he did throw
19:08
a glass of tomato juice in her face once. She
19:11
ran all the way across town to my aunt and uncle.
19:13
She was so upset, in the dead of winter, but she
19:16
had a tough life and she never married. To my
19:19
knowledge, Bob, she never dated. I just, it was
19:23
just hard to be around her because she, and I
19:25
talk about it a lot, I have a whole chapter on
19:27
her in the book in terms of, you know, her not
19:30
being able to deal with, you know, anything.
19:33
You know, everything would tick her off. And
19:35
the pastor indicated to me that she told him
19:39
that she was an alcoholic. She told him? She
19:42
told him that she was an alcoholic. And I never
19:45
saw it. I had no clue that she... She had a problem.
19:50
I didn't. But she lived alone. Right. And you
19:54
didn't really see her that much. I didn't see
19:55
her that much. I think the last time I saw her
19:57
in person was my cousin Diane passed away down
20:01
in Waseca. And I went down there and typical
20:05
of Gayl, that was her name, my sister, I walked
20:08
in and she looks at me and she goes, “Oh, I see
20:10
the big shot’s here.” That's what she said to me.
20:13
And I just walked past her. Not, “How are you doing?
20:15
Good to see you”? Yeah, no, nothing. Nothing.
20:18
So you can get a sense of there's some issues
20:21
there, right? But yeah, that was something that
20:24
was shocking to me. And the pastor talked about
20:28
sitting with her as she was talking about her
20:31
life. And he'd say, “Well, is there someone you're
20:33
going to miss? Is there a love?” No, no one. No
20:37
one. And that just, that's just shocking. That
20:40
you're on your deathbed. And you can't come to
20:44
anything that would identify that I'm going to
20:47
miss family, I'm going to miss whatever, nothing.
20:51
You have no one that you feel that you had love
20:54
for, whether it's your mother, your father, your
20:56
brother, whoever, male or female that you had
21:00
a relationship with, no one. That was shocking.
21:04
It really was shocking. I think you mentioned
21:07
earlier, there was seven years difference, right?
21:09
Yeah, well, six and a half. Six and a half, okay.
21:11
So she graduated seven years before you did, then,
21:13
from high school. Yeah, she graduated when she
21:16
was 17. Oh, so she started school like she's
21:19
still in 1949. Yeah, yeah. Yeah. She's born late
21:22
in the year and started late as a four-year-old.
21:24
And so she was always among the younger kids
21:26
in her class, I suppose. Yeah, you know, and
21:29
she was diagnosed farsighted and, you know, wore
21:32
the heavy thick glasses growing up at four years
21:36
old. And she bore that. And you know, back then,
21:39
Bob, that you didn't have the contacts. I mean,
21:42
they were heavy, you know, glass, you know. hard
21:46
contacts back then. We didn't have the money
21:49
to be able to afford to get her those. She did,
21:53
once she got out on her own, she didn't wear
21:55
contacts, but it really affected her self -esteem
21:58
in a lot of ways. And she was very, she liked
22:00
me. I'm 6'1". My sister was 5'10". She was
22:03
tall, lanky, like me. I don't think she ever
22:09
felt comfortable in her body, although I thought
22:11
she was attractive. Chapter 3 is called “My Sister
22:16
Gayl.” It's spelled G-A-Y-L. A little different
22:19
spelling. It's a different spelling. Was there
22:21
a family history? No, my mom just kind of...
22:24
I think my mom had somebody that she knew that
22:28
had that name and she liked it. Yeah, you described
22:33
that she was kind of a loner. She was a loner.
22:37
She had some friends, but sometimes she was estranged
22:40
from them. Yeah, she had a hard time just keeping
22:44
relationships. I remember back when I had a relationship
22:47
before I was married, I'd take her to the airport.
22:51
She did a lot of traveling. When she passed,
22:54
she had a law firm that handled her estate. And
22:58
she had quite a bit of money that we both inherited
23:02
from... my mom's side of the family. And she
23:06
did a lot of traveling around the world. And
23:08
I got all of her photos. Yeah. Of her travels.
23:12
I mean, she was in Ireland. She could kiss the
23:14
Blarney Stone. She was in India. She was down
23:16
in Brazil. All over the world. Yeah, she was
23:19
all over the place. But I remember taking her
23:21
to the airport, and she would go with a group
23:23
of other women. Yeah. And I'd meet, you know,
23:25
that was back when you could go to the gate.
23:27
Right. I remember. And I'd meet these women
23:31
at the gate and say hi and that, and then I'd
23:34
go to pick her up afterwards and I'd be sitting
23:37
there and the women would get off the plane, Bob,
23:40
and no Gayl. What the hell happened? Did she
23:46
miss the flight? Eventually she'd get off, and
23:50
I said, “Oh, you weren't sitting with your friends?”
23:53
And she goes, “Oh, they pissed me off,” and she'd
23:55
start rambling about that they got crossways.
23:59
Okay, and she did that to me twice, two different
24:01
sets of friends and she asked me the third time
24:05
to do the same thing, take her to the airport.
24:07
I said, okay. I said, “I can't, I'm tied up that
24:10
Day.” Yeah, I just didn't want to deal with that.
24:13
Yeah. When she worked, and it's interesting because
24:17
she worked as a prison supervisor lockup. Yeah,
24:21
it was a prison in Shakopee, and she lived in Shakopee.
24:24
And when she passed, I wanted to do an obituary
24:27
for her to put in the local paper in Shakopee.
24:30
And of course, our hometown was seeking county
24:33
news. And so I called up to get some information
24:37
on the dates. I called the prison to get the
24:39
dates when she worked there. And they go, “Well,
24:41
we have no record of her. We don't know who you're
24:42
talking about. We have no idea what you're talking
24:44
about or who she is.” And I went, “Well, I know
24:47
she, I have pictures of her with her uniform
24:50
on. I mean, what are you saying?” “Well, we expunged
24:53
records after so many years.” Okay. All right.
24:57
She goes, “Well, call the State Department of
25:00
Corrections.” So I called the Minnesota State
25:03
Department of Corrections. Oh, there's no record.
25:05
No record. And then I called the woman in HR
25:08
back at the prison. And she goes, “Well, listen,
25:11
I've got a former employee that's coming in for
25:14
a luncheon here next week.” And she goes, “She
25:17
was there, according to you, about the same time
25:19
that your sister would have worked here. So I
25:21
will ask her if she remembers Gayl.” And God bless
25:25
the woman. She called me back after they had
25:28
the luncheon. And she said, yes, she did remember
25:30
your sister. So my wife Sandee and I kind of speculated,
25:35
did she witness something? Were they protecting
25:39
her in some fashion? I don't know. Or maybe
25:42
they just expounded the records and it was all
25:45
new people and nobody remembered her. You know,
25:47
that's entirely possible. But it makes you wonder.
25:49
Oh yeah. It turns you into a conspiracy theorist.
25:52
It does. Come on. You're hiding something. How
25:54
can they not know? Yeah. I mean, there's computers
25:57
now. There's been computers. There's got to be
25:59
something somewhere. Yeah. But you know, it's
26:01
interesting that that was her profession. But
26:03
after she left that job and she retired at like
26:06
50. She retired like at 50 from the prison.
26:10
So she took odd jobs around the Shakopee area.
26:13
And I had a friend who was the public works director
26:17
for Shakopee. And she was chair of the Planning
26:21
Commission, my sister, in Shakopee for a number
26:24
of years. Very active in the Democratic Party,
26:27
my sister was. She was treasurer of the Scott
26:29
County DFL. I've got pictures of her with Perpich
26:33
and all the elite. uh, DFL people back in the
26:39
day, uh, you know, when she was active, but,
26:43
you know, she'd get a job at, I don't know, Lowe's
26:46
or someplace. She'd last a few months, she’s get
26:48
pissed off at somebody, didn't like it, quit.
26:51
And he would share that with me. Oh, you know,
26:54
I hear Gayl was working here and now she's not.
26:56
Now she's, you know, so he kind of kept me in
26:58
the loop in terms of what she was up to, because
27:00
I, again, like I said, I didn't have a relationship
27:02
with her. Yeah. You mentioned, and they said
27:05
chapter 3 is devoted to Gayl, and you mentioned
27:08
some things in that chapter. There was a point
27:10
in, because it sounds like it was kind of a strained
27:13
relationship all along, but you had sent a letter
27:16
to her. Talk about a little bit about that letter.
27:18
What the reason for that was and what response,
27:21
if any, you got. Yeah, I included the letter
27:23
in the book. Right. What was going on then is
27:26
our son, Josh, he was having a concert in elementary
27:30
School, and we had invited Gayl to come up for
27:32
the concert. And she came up and we, of course,
27:36
had Sandee's parents over as well because we're
27:39
all gonna go together and, of course, I didn't
27:41
share that necessarily with Gayl that, you know,
27:43
that Sandee's parents were gonna be there but you would
27:45
have assumed that. Right. So she gets to the
27:49
house and we were living in Spring Lake Park
27:51
at the time, and she sees Sandee's parents and
27:55
she just goes out into the living room and she
27:57
didn't come into the kitchen where they are and
28:00
I walked out to the living room, and she goes,
28:02
“Well, I'm not feeling well. I'm going to go home.
28:05
OK. I won't be able to stay.” So she left. So,
28:09
you know, I called her the next day and I said,
28:11
you know, “What what's going on? Well, you know,
28:14
I mean, you drove up and you were sick at the
28:16
begin with and you still drove up.” And it doesn't
28:19
make sense. “I don't like your in-laws.”
28:22
How many times has she even seen you? Well, maybe
28:26
once or twice. We did travel together to Santa
28:28
Fe, New Mexico, just as a trip together. Gayl
28:32
was with Sandee's mom and dad, who were just wonderful
28:36
people. I mean, her dad's passed now, but her
28:38
mom is still alive. Wonderful people. I don't
28:40
see anybody who could hate them. Nobody, right?
28:44
So, apparently, my father-in-law had asked
28:47
Gayl about her personal life. and relationships,
28:51
you know, who you date, you know. Yeah. Which
28:54
is an innocent question, but she took it. Oh,
28:56
she took it. Yeah. Right. She took it as, you
28:58
know, “none of your damn business” kind of thing,
29:00
and “how dare you” kind of thing. And she
29:03
told me that on the phone. She goes, well, “how
29:05
dare you” know. I said, “Come on, Gayl. Really?
29:07
Just trying to make conversation. He's just making
29:09
a conversation with you.” Seriously. So you can
29:13
see the issues with her. So I wrote her a letter
29:16
after that. And in the letter, I just encouraged
29:19
her because, you know, I was dealing with a lot
29:21
of anger. You had your own issues. Yeah, I had
29:24
my own issues—and still do, to some degree. It
29:26
never goes totally away. But, you know, I went
29:29
to counseling when I turned 40 with encouragement
29:32
of my wife, Sandee, because it was affecting our
29:35
marriage and went there for two years. And in
29:38
the letter, I encouraged my sister to do the
29:39
same thing. Of course, that pissed her off. Right.
29:41
To be told you need to see someone Yeah. Right.
29:43
Yeah. They can take that thing. You know, I was
29:44
just trying to encourage her to say, hey, you
29:47
know, “I got help. It did a lot for me. You know,
29:50
I really would encourage you to check it out.”
29:53
You know? Yeah. No. She didn't take that too
29:55
well, then? No. Did she even respond? Like, did
29:57
she call you back? No. No. Or did she send a
29:58
reply saying, “Mind your own business”? No. Or
30:00
nothing? Wow, that was it. Okay. No, that's,
30:03
that's too bad. Yeah, it is. It is. You know,
30:07
I did, I think, I take that back, Bob. I guess
30:09
I did get, I must've got an email response or
30:14
something from her about the letter at one time.
30:16
Okay. That gave me a sense of that it pissed
30:18
her off, which I knew it did because she didn't
30:20
respond. But yeah. Yeah. Anyway. That's a tough
30:23
thing. You mentioned that. She was about 72 when
30:28
she passed away. It was a heart attack. Massive
30:31
heart attack, yep. Let's talk a little bit about
30:34
the funeral service for her. You read the lyrics
30:38
of a song. Yeah, I did. By Steppenwolf. Steppenwolf,
30:41
yeah. “It's Never Too Late.” “Never Too Late” is
30:43
the name of the song. The album I looked at,
30:45
it was “At Your Birthday Party,” the album it came
30:48
out with. And what's that song about, basically?
30:52
Well, it's never too late suggesting we can turn
30:55
things around. That's really the point of it
30:58
is that, you know, you can hurt people, you can
31:01
do things, but there's always an opportunity
31:04
for you to change direction and do go a different
31:08
direction and, you know, in essence, repent.
31:11
Right, right. And then change. And that's really
31:15
what I wanted to point out that Gayl didn't.
31:18
do. As the pastor indicated on her deathbed that
31:22
she couldn't come to grips with, even in her
31:25
deathbed, what she had done and how many people
31:28
she had hurt. It's just, it's mind boggling.
31:32
It really is. And that's the reason I read, you
31:35
know, the verses, the lyrics to the song. You
31:39
didn't sing it? Oh, no. It must have been kind
31:43
of hard reading that. I broke up. Because I read
31:45
the lyrics. It's emotional. Yeah, I broke up
31:48
when I was reading it. It was hard. You know,
31:51
and people were shocked, Bob, that, you know,
31:53
knowing the history between the two of us, that
31:56
I would even have a service for her. I had the
31:59
pastor who was with her that night. She was a
32:02
member of Mount Olivet Lutheran Church, but
32:04
it was the Victoria West Campus. Right, that's
32:08
a big parish. Yeah, I mean the Mount Olivet in
32:12
Minneapolis is huge. Yeah. I don't know how many,
32:14
10,000 members? It's a huge church. But anyway,
32:17
they have multiple pastors and she ended up giving
32:20
half of her estate to the church. And the other
32:24
half went to the Minnesota Landscape Arboretum,
32:26
University of Minnesota Landscape Arboretum.
32:29
So, you know, they had that connection with
32:31
her, although the pastor, the Pastor Dixon that
32:35
was with her didn't know her at all. Yeah, didn't
32:40
know her at all. So, you know, how active she
32:42
was, I don't know. Right, yeah, you can be a
32:46
member of a parish or a church and not necessarily
32:48
be involved. Yeah, I mean, he probably shook
32:51
her hand, you know, leaving the service or whatever.
32:55
But yeah, at any rate, she's in a columbarium niche
32:59
there. at Mount Olivet in Victoria. And that's
33:02
where we had a little service. And, of course,
33:04
then I said I did the blurbs in the local paper
33:08
and Waseca paper about her and her passing. And
33:12
people were shocked that I did that. And I just
33:16
told people. She was your sister. It was my sister,
33:19
one, and I'm not going to act like her. I wouldn't
33:24
do that. That's not who I am. I'm going to honor
33:27
her because I loved my sister. She could be fun.
33:31
She could be a good person at times. She really
33:34
could be. I had fun with her over the years at
33:36
times. There's no question about that. It's just
33:39
sad because reading this chapter was probably
33:41
the, this one might have affected me as much as
33:43
any chapter in the book because it's like, she
33:45
was your only sibling. Yeah. And I just think
33:47
about what she missed out on. I mean, all the,
33:50
even if she never married herself and had a relationship,
33:53
the things that she could have shared with you
33:54
guys, you know. Certain milestones in Josh, your
33:58
son Josh's life or something, or Trish's graduation,
34:02
you know different things that she could have
34:03
been a part of and she missed out on all that
34:05
Stuff. I remember, you know, I called her up to
34:08
tell her that I was engaged to Sandee, right, and
34:10
it'll be 40 years here. No. Yeah, so yeah, it's
34:13
lasted Yeah, and I was talking around the phone
34:17
and she goes, “Why would you want to marry her?
34:19
She's got a kid and she's divorced.” And I, and
34:22
I literally went on the phone, I said, “You know
34:25
what Gayl? F you.” I said, “You don't understand.”
34:29
And she'd only met her once. It almost sounds
34:31
like jealousy or envy. Like it's never gonna
34:34
happen to me so I can't be happy for somebody
34:36
else. The only time she hadn't met her I think
34:38
was at, my parents had a 40th wedding anniversary
34:41
like we're having this year. And Sandee and I
34:44
were dating, and Sandee came down and was at that.
34:47
And she met Gayl that time. And obviously found
34:51
out that... either through me or through my parents
34:54
that, you know, that she was previously married
34:56
and had a child. Mm -hmm. And who I raised. Right,
35:01
yeah, because Trish was only about six or seven
35:02
when you guys met. Yeah, yeah, she was six. Okay.
35:05
So probably five when we first met. Oh. So yeah.
35:09
But at any rate, you know, that burned me and
35:10
she didn't come to the wedding. Yeah. She was
35:13
Traveling, though. That was it. In chapter 3,
35:20
I just want to mention it because you included
35:21
it. You did talk about it in chapter 3,
35:25
the passing of your mom and dad. Can you briefly
35:27
explain or talk about that? What happened to
35:30
both of them? Yeah, your mom was sick. I know.
35:32
But yeah, my mom had gotten ovarian cancer in
35:36
1990 and she went to St. Mary's in Rochester
35:41
to have a hysterectomy and she had a stroke.
35:45
surgery and it paralyzed her. On top of the cancer,
35:48
she had a stroke. And was paralyzed on her right
35:53
side and was basically wheelchair bound the rest
35:55
of her life. She lasted about another year, just
35:57
a year and a half out of that. I remember, Bob,
36:01
and it's really difficult for me taking her to
36:03
treatments in Saint Mary's, you know, because
36:06
she was still trying to live at home in Waseca
36:08
and my dad was drunk and in no position to really
36:11
care. And she ultimately moved up to a nursing
36:14
facility in Shakopee near my sister. And that's
36:17
the, where she was when she passed. But, you know,
36:20
she was, I'd have to, you know, I had a bucket
36:23
for her because she was throwing up from the
36:25
treatments. And I'd have to stop along the road
36:28
to empty the bucket. Yeah, that's tough. Mm -hmm.
36:32
Yeah, and your dad? Well my dad, he died in ‘91—
36:38
1990. 1990. My mom died in 91 right April 3rd of
36:42
91. My dad died November 22nd in 1990, and, it was
36:48
right before Thanksgiving. Yeah, and I was calling
36:51
and try to get a hold of him. I was gonna go down
36:53
and see him And I couldn't get a hold of them.
36:56
So I called my cousin, Diane, who's the one I'd
36:59
gone to the funeral, where my sister said, we're
37:00
in the big shots here. So I owed Diane a lot.
37:04
So I called up Diane, and back then it was just
37:07
landlines, right? Yeah, no cell phones. There
37:09
was no cell phones. So I called Diane, and I
37:12
got her on the phone. And I said, Diane, can
37:14
you go down to the house and see if the car's
37:15
in the garage? And knock on the door and see
37:18
if you can get in and check on Dad. So she does.
37:21
She has to go back home. Calls me back up on
37:24
the landline and said, car's in the garage, door's
37:27
locked, he's not answering. I said, well, I said,
37:32
call the police, have them break in. And they
37:35
did. And they found him humped over, in the bathroom,
37:38
over the sink. Rigor mortis had started to set in,
37:40
and he'd been dead for a period of time. And
37:43
he died of a massive heart attack. Oh, okay.
37:45
How many days do you think he'd been... Probably
37:48
a couple of days. They didn't do an autopsy or
37:50
anything like that? No. Okay. But a couple of
37:53
days, he died alone. Yeah. You know, what's really
37:57
bizarre, and I'd read about it in the book, Bob,
37:59
is that he had a bench warrant for his arrest,
38:03
that he had come back from visiting Mom drunk.
38:06
Up in Shakopee, back down to Waseca, which is,
38:09
you know, probably a 40-minute drive, something
38:12
like that, 45-minute drive. And he side -swiped
38:15
a car going the other direction. Oh, no. Oh.
38:18
And kept going. Oh. The guy got the plate, right?
38:22
Yeah. So they're looking for him. Oh, my gosh.
38:26
So I had to go to Judge McClune at the time.
38:29
And I had to provide the death certificate. to
38:32
get the case closed on my dad. It's not in the
38:37
book, right? Oh yeah, no, I talked about that.
38:39
Oh my gosh. Yeah, so that was just bizarre. And
38:43
of course, my dad loved Cadillacs. He had a Sedan
38:46
de Ville. He always had to have a sedan de Ville
38:49
Cadillac. And it was scratched across the side.
38:53
So my sister and I, after both passed, my mom
38:57
and dad passed, five months apart. We got it
39:01
repaired and then we sold it to the one of the
39:03
Anderson Cadillac here in the Cities. Okay. Okay. And which
39:06
is no longer there. Yeah. It's closed now. But
39:09
yeah. Anyway, we sold it back to the dealership.
39:12
But yeah, that was crazy story. So your mom was
39:16
terminally ill or seriously ill. Right. You kind
39:20
of were expecting that. Yeah. But with
39:22
your dad, that was unexpected, right? Oh, absolutely.
39:24
I mean, he actually went before your mother did.
39:26
He did. He did by five months. Yeah, and it's
39:29
tough for me. I got to say goodbye to my mom.
39:31
I didn't get to say goodbye to my dad. That's
39:34
tough when you can't say goodbye. Dad was a good
39:39
person. He really was. He really was a good person.
39:44
He had an illness. Yeah, that's tough. I want
39:47
to share an anecdote with you. You might not
39:48
remember this. I remember you telling me about
39:51
your dad passing. Yeah. And the reason I remember
39:53
is because you and I were actually going to go
39:55
to a (Gophers) football game that Saturday. OK. It was
39:58
November 24, 1990. They were going to play the
40:01
Iowegians—Iowa. And Iowa had really good football
40:03
back then. They had actually tied for the Big
40:05
Ten Championship that year. And you told me,
40:08
you know. a couple days before the game. You said,
40:11
you know, I'm not gonna make it. I was really
40:13
sorry to hear that. And I said, but I said, I'll
40:17
find somebody to go to the game. Do you remember
40:20
a friend of mine, he worked at Prudential with
40:22
me, his name was Bob Rose? Sure. And I remember I called
40:25
him and said, “Would you like to see the game?”
40:27
And I told him that, you know, your dad had passed
40:30
away, and he met me at the Dome, the Metrodome,
40:33
where the game was. He had lost his dad just
40:35
a year before. And he felt really bad and he
40:37
said, be sure to send him
40:39
my condolences. But I just remembered when I
40:42
read the part about your dad passing, I go,
40:44
that's when that time we went to the football
40:45
game, because you couldn't make it, obviously.
40:48
Yeah. What happened? I was dealing with that.
40:49
November of 1990. Wow. Yeah. Wow. Wow. So. Yeah.
40:53
You know, it's tough. I mean, you've lost both
40:55
your parents, too, Bob. And it's hard not having
40:58
them in your life. Oh, yeah. You know, even all
41:01
the issues I had and the trauma around my dad
41:03
that I write about in the book, I miss them.
41:06
Oh, of course, of course. And my mom and I were
41:08
really close. Yeah. You know, because, you know,
41:10
my sister moved out and my dad was either drunk
41:13
or working. So, or passed out or whatever. Yeah.
41:17
It was just the two of us. And we were really
41:19
close. And if you saw a picture of my mom, I
41:23
looked like my mom. My sister looked like my
41:25
dad. Okay, my sister had dark hair, my dad had
41:29
dark hair. I don't even hardly remember my dad
41:31
with dark hair. I think he always had silver
41:33
gray hair. And my sister, obviously, colored her
41:37
hair until the latter part of her years and then
41:40
she just let it go gray. My mom died at 64. She
41:46
never colored her hair. She still had brown hair.
41:49
I'm 70. Yeah, you're not gray. I'm not gray,
41:52
really. I got a little gray developing. Nobody's
41:56
going to call you the Silver Fox. And like I
41:59
said before, the DNA that I have that doesn't
42:03
trigger the alcoholism is because I have more
42:06
of that on my mother's side than I do on my dad's
42:09
side. And that's going to take us to the end
42:13
of Part One of our two-part episode with my
42:15
guest, Tom Madigan, author of “I Survived: Living
42:19
with the Trauma of a Dependent Parent.” We just
42:22
finished covering chapters 1, 2, and 3
42:25
in his book. In Part Two of this two-part podcast,
42:29
we'll cover the remaining chapters, 4 through
42:31
8. And again, to our listeners, thanks for
42:34
hangin’ out with me, Bob Edholm, and my guest,
42:37
Tom Madigan. Be sure to catch Part Two of our
42:40
discussion of Tom's book, “I Survived: Living
42:43
with the Trauma of a Dependent Parent,” wherever
42:45
you listen to your podcasts. Until then, bye-eee!