Overcoming Roadblocks

By Patrick Flanders

This book describes the life story of events that started with a baby in Chicago born from an entrepreneur and his secretary. The mother was a Polish descendant who never knew her family ancestry. This boy grew up during the 1970s and 1980s in Chicago and Maryland.

The journey includes how this boy overcame suicide, alcoholism, getting expelled from middle school, arrests, DUIs, three divorces, and injuries from car accidents, a shovel to the head, a gunshot, seizures, and a motorcycle traumatic brain injury (TBI). He overcame these roadblocks and became a US Marine Persian Gulf War veteran, college senator, graduate with a BS in chemical engineering, successful salesman, business owner, and more.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Page Publishing, Inc.
• Release date: Dec 2, 2021
• ISBN: 9781662449352

Book preview

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Overcoming Roadblocks

Patrick Flanders

Copyright © 2021 Patrick Flanders

All rights reserved

First Edition

PAGE PUBLISHING, INC.

Conneaut Lake, PA

First originally published by Page Publishing 2021

ISBN 978-1-6624-4934-5 (pbk)

ISBN 978-1-6624-4935-2 (digital)

Printed in the United States of America

Table of Contents

Chicago Fire

Divorced Parents

Expelled from Middle School

Arrests, Shovel, Gunshot

Loss of Athletic Scholarships

Pumpkin Patch and Cocaine

HS Diploma, Maybe?

Persian Gulf and Chemical Warfare

College Senator

DuPont Years

Sales and Seizures

Motorcycle Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI)

Post-TBI

State-to-State Moves

Chapter Oklahoma

Chapter Arizona

Chapter KC Again

Chapter Wichita

Chapter Welch—Final Round

Chapter Florida: Recovery then Success

Debt Free and Retirement

My life’s motto has always been Work hard, play hard.

Chapter 1

Chicago Fire

This story starts with a baby born to two grateful parents. The pregnancy was not planned, as this was normal for the late 1960s. Later in life, I found that my parents were married in early September of 1969. This caused some questions as I was born on March 15, 1970 (the Ides of March). Now, do the math, and you will come up with 6.5 months, not 9. So I thought shotgun wedding. As it plays out, the parents claimed to not know about the pregnancy or thought I would be bad at math. Unfortunately for them, I was good at math and have a very upfront bold personality. So I asked, but I believe that they had an agreement, which they would take to the grave.

My mother was born in Chicago in the Polish immigrant district of Gage Park near Midway Airport. Her parents were Polish, and their parents immigrated to the United States from Poland around the turn into the twentieth century. She had three sisters, a Navy WWII veteran father, and a mother (my grandmother) who was described as very strict. I don’t think my grandmother had a choice on her demeanor because of the era and location and size of the family. I believed I was the favorite grandchild, so I may defend my grandmother more than others. The Polish ancestry shows that most of the family lived and died in this Chicago community.

My father was born and raised in Oklahoma. His ancestry goes back several generations until the mid-1600s, where two brothers (named Flanders) traveled to America via ship from England. Which, yes, my ancestry was part of the revolutionary war and part of the original founders of this country. My father’s American bloodline started in Massachusetts, and a lawyer near Philadelphia had a son, named Henry, which decided to take a chance with the new Louisiana Purchase and move west to the Kansas City area. The recent descendants moved from Kansas City down to the old Indian territory, which became Oklahoma. You may be thinking, and yes, my great-grandmother was a Cherokee Indian.

My father transferred to Chicago for a job and somehow hired this pretty young Polish girl as his secretary. Yes, he talked a good game with the ladies. As I have lived on earth and interacted with my parents over forty years, I truly can guess how this relationship evolved.

At some point, I was born in Chicago, and we eventually were living in Elk Grove. I can remember small little commercials of memory, which included my parents arguing and our apartment on fire. Also, my dad’s brothers, from Oklahoma, teaching me how to play cards. I had to be around two years old, but somehow, I remember. I think my brain remembers the important memories and discards the rest. I believe the reason for my brain memory recall of the arguing was to understand the future divorce. And the fire recalls to title this chapter of my first book and first chapter. The recall of my uncles was because I did not have any other memories of my one uncle, named Ricky. He died soon after in a hunting accident.

The memory of the fire was weird because I could feel the warmth as I recalled the memory. No, I do not think I am an alien. In the memory, I was in my mother’s arms, and she was very afraid. I sensed. My father was running in and out of the apartment, grabbing household items. Later in life, he said the items were just some documents and keys.

In my mind, soon after the fire, we moved to Maryland. My father took another job, and he left to get settled, then we followed. I did not remember any of that, but soon I will start remembering things.

Chapter 2

Divorced Parents

The year was 1970-something, and I started to attend school in our new city and state of Columbia, Maryland.

My mother found a job with an up-and-coming company named the Rouse Company. They owned