Each week, the Shreveport-Bossier Journal’s Tony Taglavore takes to lunch a local person – someone who is well-known, successful, and/or influential, and asks, “What’s Your Story?”
By TONY TAGLAVORE, Journal Services
Barely a year into his second career as a licensed professional counselor, the “Bossier City boy through and through” was blindsided.
“I got a call.”
Boy, did he.
“Unless the two of you can tell me a good reason, this is my last phone call,” said the voice on the other end.
Emphasis on the word “last.”
“I knew exactly what he meant.”
The counselor, along with his co-host, was hosting a LIVE radio show. He knew exactly what had to be done.
“We kept that man on the phone. We passed him back and forth off-air . . . . We pieced together enough information to find out where he was. We got the Emergency Medical Technicians (EMT’s) to him.”
But were the EMT’s been able to save the man? The counselor had no idea.
“A couple of weeks later, this guy calls back . . . . He says, ‘I gotta tell you something. This radio show saved my life.”
The counselor pauses while talking to me. His 68-year-old eyes begin to fill with tears.
“At this point, I’m thinking, ‘I will do this show forever.’ That’s it. That’s what you want to do.”
David McMillian, still the co-host of Strategies for Living, who spent 30 years as a licensed professional counselor and now devotes much of his time to being a Life Coach, told me that story – and his story – during lunch at a place David chose, Strawn’s Eat Shop. We both had a burger and fries. David had Coke to drink, and I had water with lemon. We both showed great restraint by not having any pie.
“We did what we could to connect him with the help he needed that day. If I would have never heard back from him, I would have been at peace because I knew we did everything we could for a stranger.”
David’s talents in helping people through their most trying times – grief, divorce, abuse – began as a child, although he didn’t know it at the time.
“My Christian faith has always been extremely important. From when I was a little boy, I was taught, ‘Do unto others as you would have them do unto you.’ Be kind. Be considerate. Help people. That was just a way of life for me. I didn’t question it.”
That belief developed while living across the street from Christ the King Catholic Church.
“We always had a priest over at the house. We were kind of their getaway. I heard lots of stories. Any trauma I was exposed to was secondary because it was helping somebody through the church deal with whatever. It might have been grief or death, but it was learning to help people.”
In fact, David considered going into the ministry as a Catholic priest. There was just one problem.
“I liked girls too much, so that wasn’t going to work for me.”
After school and during summer, from his youth through high school, you could always find David at one of 14 A & P grocery stores. His father – “Everybody called him Mister Mac” – managed one of the stores. “I hung out a lot at the store. Everybody called me ‘Littler Mister Mac.’”
“That was the greatest thing for me, Tony, because it gave me a work ethic. It gave me the understanding of how to interact with people.”
Christ The King School didn’t offer much when it came to sports, but when David got to Jesuit High School (now Loyola College Prep), he tried out for the football team. Let’s just say he didn’t see things too clearly.
“I wore glasses. The coach was a priest, and he made me take off my glasses. I said, ‘Father Coach, I can’t see.’ He put me at tight end. First practice, I ran a down-and-out-route. The quarterback threw me the ball, and I caught it – right in my helmet. That was the end of my football career.”
After graduating from LSU Shreveport in marketing, David went on a 17-year radio run. He was an on-air talent, sales manager, station manager, and co-owner. But one morning while at a youth soccer match, David found himself making small talk with a man David knew was a counselor.
“I said, ‘Gee, I would love to do what you do.’ He said, ‘Well, you know what? You would be dog gone good at it. Why don’t you buy me lunch and let’s talk about it?’”
A meal later (remember the old Kon-Tiki?), David found himself in a classroom at Louisiana Tech’s Barksdale campus. Turns out, the counselor was also a professor.
“I knew I was home. Even though I really didn’t have a whole lot of background, it was almost like I understood wat was being talked about.”
David went on to earn a master’s degree in counseling, while continuing to work full-time in radio. Just four months after going into practice on nights and weekends, he was too busy to do both jobs. Guess which field he chose?
“I look at it as a sacred privilege to be able to accompany somebody during a hard time, or a time in their life that is problematic in some way. It’s awe-inspiring to watch people grow and change to the point of being able to say, ‘I don’t think I need to come anymore.’ It’s a funny profession. If you’re really focused on doing the profession the right way, you’re trying to rope yourself out of a job from day one.”
This year marks Strategies for Living’s 32nd year. These days, David co-hosts with his wife of almost five years, Lauren.
“What most of us are looking for is to be understood. People need love. People need to feel heard and understood. A lot of people’s problems are that they feel lonely and misunderstood. They are not connected. A church community is a great place to get connected and be heard, but we know lot of people are not churched today.”
Trying not to take advantage of my time with David by telling him all my issues, I asked my final question. As always, what is it that he has learned in life that might be helpful to others?
“I’m absolutely positive we’re all children of God. We’re all brothers and sisters. It doesn’t matter what our life situation is. Whether we’re rich or poor, black or white, we’re all children of God. We’re one. Even though our ego doesn’t want us to believe this, we’re all headed to the same destination. We’re going to walk through a doorway called death. I’m absolutely certain life goes on beyond the death of a human body. It’s been shown to me and proven to me over and over.”
You and I just got a free life coach lesson. You’re welcome.
Do you know someone with a story? Email SBJTonyT@gmail.com.
The Journal’s weekly “What’s Your Story?” series is sponsored by Morris & Dewett Injury Lawyers.