Porch Talk with Mike Wilson

Mike Wilson

by Donna Geer, Staff Writer

He has that rare ability to remember calendar dates as if they happened yesterday, like the first time he met his wife, and the day she became his girlfriend. He remembers when an investment company called him on his mother’s birthday and offered him the job on his wife’s birthday two days later. It certainly got his attention. Is he a numbers guy? He might be. Or maybe he’s just more mindful of coincidences.

Mike Wilson was born in Georgia and raised in Alabama. His mother ran a daycare out of the family home, and his father was a preacher and a farmer until he retired. The family moved to Maryland when Mike was seven years old.  He says his family didn’t have a lot, but they had enough and that’s really all that mattered. Never the rebellious sort, he followed most of the family rules. He was always mindful of his father, though he says he got in trouble once when he rode his dirt bike into Devil’s Canyon and jumped off wooden ramps he and his friend Doug had built. He wasn’t supposed to be there.

After high school, he started college in 1990, but his heart wasn’t in it, so he worked for Radio Shack and then Circuit City before enlisting in the Marines months later. He was in the military for a total of fourteen years across two separate enlistments. The first time he enlisted, he was in infantry. From 1990 – 1994, he was stationed in places like Somalia, Bosnia, Haiti, Cuba, and Okinawa. It was one of his units that pulled U.S. military forces out of Somalia in 1994, six months after a failed mission in 1993 to capture a warlord resulted in the deaths of many U. S. soldiers and Somalian civilians.

Mike reenlisted in the Marines in January 2001. He was deployed to both Afghanistan and Iraq a total of seven times before becoming a Chief Instructor. He taught courses in finance, showing service members how to maximize their assets. He also taught more traditional classes, like the two-week training course for non-infantry military in Camp Lejeune, NC that included an endurance course in murky swamp water. Their Operations Center was a building outfitted by the Navy Seabees for their own certifications, something Mike orchestrated with $10K and a lot of goodwill. That course covered convoy operations, navigation, and how to shoot a machine gun.

In 2008, he created a video course  that mirrored the same concepts. The Marines still use it today. It covers procedures for clearing a room, convoy operations, and communications.

Mike left the military in 2010 and started working for Home Depot in California as a Loss Prevention Manager. He’d followed a girl to the west coast, but realized it wasn’t meant to be, so he put in his two-week notice in 2011 so he could go home to Alabama. And then fate stepped in. He was just doing his job, he said. He needed a witness for a female shoplifter, so he asked Amanda Rodriguez, an employee from the flooring desk, to be a witness during the questioning of the shoplifter. He and Amanda hardly spoke during the whole ordeal, but there was just something about her that he couldn’t shake. He pulled his resignation letter the next day.

Mike says they got to know each other through “goofy” conversations. Then it was a lunch date on Sep 1, 2011. And then another. They married on 12/12/12 and have a ten-year-old daughter named Joscelynn. He says it’s the best thing that’s ever happened to him. Amanda is his partner in everything, but being a “girl dad” is what really changed him. He was a Marine during very violent times, but now he’s a Disney dad with a golden retriever. He’s even seen both of the Wicked films. His family means everything to him.

If you’ve frequented The Beach Club lately, you might have met him. He’s the new General Manager of the LMC (Ludlow Maintenance Commission). He has a degree in Business Management and Marketing, and certifications in CMCA (Certified Manager of Community Associations) and AMS (Association Management Specialist). He’s currently working on his PCAM (Professional Community Association Manager) certification. He’s an easy-going guy, interested in new ideas for the community, hoping to establish stronger bonds between the North and South Bay clubs.

He really likes Port Ludlow because there’s so much to do. Every single day, he sees beautiful views of the water and the trees. Deer frequently wander through his yard, and the school bus drops his daughter off in front of their house. It’s where he wants to retire. In this quiet peaceful town, people look out for each other. That’s why he lives in the community he manages.

When I asked him what he wished he could do over, Mike Wilson couldn’t come up with one single thing. It’s because of the butterfly effect, he said. In chaos theory, that’s where one small modification can ripple through time and cause something unpredictable in the future. If he changed anything, maybe he wouldn’t have become a Marine. Maybe he wouldn’t have met the love of his life or had his daughter. Maybe he wouldn’t have ended up in Port Ludlow. Maybe, maybe… No, he wouldn’t change a single thing.

You can find these and other stories online at plvoice.org. As you already know, our little town is an eclectic mix of wonderful and interesting people. Some were born here and many more come from elsewhere, but all of us have chosen to make Port Ludlow our home. Every one of us has a great story, so let’s sit on the porch and have a conversation. We can share a cup of coffee, or tea, if preferred. You can reach me at sports@plvoice.org. Looking forward to hearing from you