David Sorrentino | Photograph by Adam Williams
Overview: David Sorrentino is a veteran of the U.S. Navy and of the U.S. Army. He’s a cyclist who has completed the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route three times, connecting America’s northern and southern borders. He’s an obsessive fly fisherman of more than 50 years. He’s a raconteur who has entertained audiences, well, probably everywhere he’s gone.
He talks with Adam Williams about how the gift of telling tales came to him upon his father’s death and how cycling has changed his life, despite David’s initial pooh-poohing of being one of those men in spandex.
They also talk about how David “accidentally” enlisted in the Army after the events of 9/11, about playing hide and seek with “the most vicious animal of all the North American wilderness,” and a key life lesson that he’s picked up over his many adventurous years. Among other things.
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SHOW NOTES, LINKS, CREDITS & TRANSCRIPT
The We Are Chaffee podcast is supported by Chaffee County Public Health.
Along with being distributed on podcast listening platforms (e.g. Spotify, Apple), We Are Chaffee is broadcast weekly at 2 p.m. on Tuesdays, on KHEN 106.9 community radio FM in Salida, Colo.
David Sorrentino
Instagram: @theskinnyfish
We Are Chaffee Podcast
Website: wearechaffeepod.com
Instagram: instagram.com/wearechaffeepod
CREDITS
We Are Chaffee Host, Producer, Photographer & Website Manager: Adam Williams
We Are Chaffee Engineer & Producer: Jon Pray
We Are Chaffee Community Advocacy Coordinator: Lisa Martin
Director of Chaffee County Public Health and Environment: Andrea Carlstrom
TRANSCRIPT
Note: Transcripts are produced using a transcription service. Although it is largely accurate, minor errors inevitably exist.
[Intro music, guitar instrumental]
Adam Williams (00:00:13): Welcome to the We Are Chaffee Podcast, a conversational podcast of community, humanness and well-being rooted in Chaffee County, Colorado. I’m Adam Williams.
Today, I’m talking with David Sorrentino. David has a life story of many interesting chapters. He’s a veteran of the U.S. Navy and of the U.S. Army. He’s a cyclist who has completed the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route three times, connecting America’s northern and southern borders.
He’s an obsessive fly fisherman of more than 50 years. He’s a raconteur who has entertained audiences, well, probably everywhere he’s gone, but certainly on the Salida Moth storytelling stage in recent years, and on radio, in documentary films and …
Naturally, David tells some stories here today, too. Like the one about his Bigfoot-esque encounter in Washington state. Then there was the sea monster experience aboard a naval submarine and the sighting of, let’s say a cousin of, Nessie the Loch Ness monster, as well.
Storytelling seems to run in David’s veins, care of his father, who David calls “Lord Louie, the greatest storyteller of all.”
We talk about how the gift of telling tales came to him upon his father’s death and how cycling has changed his life, despite David’s initial pooh-poohing of being one of those men in spandex.
We also talk about how he “accidentally” enlisted in the Army after the events of 9/11, about playing hide and seek with “the most vicious animal of all the North American wilderness,” and a key life lesson that he’s picked up over his many adventurous years. Among other things.
The We Are Chaffee Podcast is supported by Chaffee County Public Health.
Go to wearechaffeepod.com to see show notes with photos, links and a transcript of the conversation. You can subscribe to the monthly email newsletter there, as well. And you can see more photos and engage with the podcast on Instagram @wearechaffeepod.
Alright. The lively, the fun, the entertaining … David Sorrentino.
[Transition music, guitar instrumental]
Adam Williams (02:15): You’re a man of stories. So, let’s talk about storytelling. You recently told a story at the Salida Moth. I think that was your fifth time. Is that right? That is correct. And you have a goal of doing 10? I do. So, this is something that you love to do?
David Sorrentino: It certainly is something I love to do. My father was a storyteller of storytellers. Every day he would come home from work and he’d sit at the kitchen table and he’d say, “You’ll never believe what happened to me today.” And oh boy, we were all ears and we wanted to hear what happened to him that day. Oftentimes, it was things like he was given 10 free chickens and put them in the back of the work truck, and his boss went to go get something and the chickens flew out on him or something spectacular happened to him each and every day that kept us well entertained.
Adam Williams: Did you ever question any of those stories? Was there a fantastical element to it that you just were like, “Ah, I don’t know, but that sure is entertaining.”
David Sorrentino (3:15): Oh, absolutely. Absolutely. He was a master at adding a little bit of salt and pepper to every story. In no way would you ever catch him in telling even a half-truth. But if the chickens flew out, they flew out with fervor. If somebody tripped, they tripped and tumbled 10 feet. It was always fun to hear.
Adam Williams: I asked that question thinking about the movie called Big Fish. That movie is probably like 20 years old or something. Did you ever see that? Do you know what I’m talking about?
David Sorrentino: You know, you had to bring that up. And you’re probably even going to announce that I actually have a crew that is making a documentary now, of which I will be the key feature in that documentary, and they keep telling me that they want to base it on the movie Big Fish and that I need to watch the movie and it’s been six months and I still haven’t watched the movie.
Adam Williams: I’m going to give the gist of it for anybody who’s unaware, and in case you don’t know, but the idea is that there’s this man on his deathbed and he’s telling these stories, the stories he’s been telling his whole life, and his now adult son is at his side trying to reconcile with this father who’s never told a true story in his life. In the son’s mind, he’s like, “Why can’t I get any truth out of my dad? You always have these fantastical stories and characters. They can’t possibly be true.” And I’m going to spoil this for you because it is 20 years older. So, basically, they go to this guy’s funeral and he realizes as all these fantastical characters also come to the funeral, there’s truth in all of his stories.
I mean, I take that away as the viewer that there’s truth in there and there also can be joy and fun and okay, maybe some embellishment. And I’m just curious for you as a storyteller, and it sounds like for your father, what that element is to you and just the love of being able to tell a story and maybe spin a yarn, add a little of that salt and pepper.
David Sorrentino: Can I give you an example?
Adam Williams: Sure.
David Sorrentino (04:20): Here in the spring, I left June 1st to do a mountain bike ride. It’s called the Great Divide Mountain Bike Route. It goes from Banff Canada to Antelope Wells, Mexico. And I was going to start in Salida, go South, go all the way back North and come back to Salida. And I left from Salida here, all prepped up for my great bike packing trip, and I got not too terribly far away and I got horribly ill, terribly for days on end. And finally, I got myself down out of the mountains and I got to a gas station and I’m sitting at the gas station wondering how am I ever going to get home? And all of a sudden, a vehicle pulled up to the pumps and I quickly texted to some friends down at Oveja Negra, “I’ll be coming home in a cow.”
Well, he thought, “David is always telling us these crazy things, and now he’s telling us he’s going to come home in a cow. What could he possibly mean? Is this some kind of a joke or a prank?” Well, several hours later, I pulled up in front of Oveja Negra and I stepped out of a giant cow. It is a cow that we have in town here that gentleman owns that was in front of a restaurant and it was converted into a van. Well, I did. I came home in a giant cow. And it was just a classic moment of, “Yeah, I’ll tell you a little bit of a story, but wait until you hear the whole thing.” The truth is oftentimes even more spectacular than what you may think.
Adam Williams: That is a fantastic example, right? Because if you’re telling that story to somebody, especially let’s think of children. If we’re talking about the father telling something to their child and they’re picturing cow, and if you don’t for a long time reveal it was a cow converted into a vehicle, there’s a lot of fantastic thinking that can go on, a lot of imagination that can happen, that so many of us, especially as we get into our adult lives and carry on throughout life, we drop that. We let go of the imagination and the fun of just a story.
David Sorrentino: Boy, life is so much fun. It is so much fun. And I think that is one of the things that I loved about my father. We called him Lord Louie. And the reason why we call him Lord Louie, in my bedroom, hung a beautiful, beautiful painting of my father, but he was dressed humorously as an admiral of a ship. And it was Lord Louie King of the Seven Seas in Saddle River. Saddle River is a horrible polluted river in New Jersey, master in his hunter’s domain. And it was a picture of my father trying to chase rabbits out of his garden. I grew up with that kind of a thing in my very own bedroom. And Lord Louie will forever stand out in my mind as the greatest storyteller of all.
Adam Williams: You grew up in New Jersey?
David Sorrentino: I did.
Adam Williams: What was that like? I think you were part of a big Italian family. Were there other storytellers, uncles, brothers, whoever that were also out of that mold and just you were surrounded by all this?
David Sorrentino: No
Adam Williams: Just your dad.
David Sorrentino: My father. My father stood out. He really truly stood out in his family. And I had uncles that were incredible characters in their own right, but he was the one that brought the family together and brought the family together in humor quite often.
Adam Williams: You have some big stories. I am sure that there are countless, so many, I wouldn’t even hardly know where to begin, but you happen to have a Bigfoot story of some kind. You were in a Bigfoot film anyway. Can I hear about that one?
David Sorrentino: Yeah. I was being interviewed for a promotional for a food bank in Snoqualmie, Washington, the Snoqualmie Valley Food Bank. And the film crew sat patiently and I was asked all kinds of questions and I answered all my questions and they filmed this whole interview. And when they were done, they were packing up their cameras and the person there in charge decided to come over and talk to me for a minute.
And he said, “We don’t have to edit much of what you said. It’s a doggone shame you don’t have a Bigfoot story because moving off right now to go interview several people who do have Bigfoot stories.” And I said, “Well, it just so happens I do.” And he asked me just some injustice of it. I gave it to him and he ordered the rest of the guys with the cameras to set up their film crew again and they filmed a story, of an encounter that I had, and I don’t call it a Bigfoot encounter. I call the being that I encountered as the Olympic tree knocker.
What happened was is a friend and I would go out to the Olympic Peninsula every March 17th because he was horrifically Irish. We had to go on this great big, horrible, cold, wet hike around the Olympic Peninsula in March so that he felt like he was back home in Ireland, I guess. And that’s what we would do. When you’re hiking around the Olympic Peninsula, you have to go from what is called headland to headland. A headland is a part of the mainland that juts out into the sea. And then, when the tide rolls in from the sea, the headland gets completely cut off from the mainland as if it were its own island. Many of them on the Olympic Peninsula will be surrounded by 30, 40, 50 feet of water simply because of how far they are out into the ocean and how much the tide comes in. They can get rather deep.
And so, when you’re out on a headland, you are isolated and insulated from all the rest of the world except for what’s going on, on your own personal headland. Well, my friend and I, we went hiking and we were on our way back and we had to crawl up a headland. We got to that headland in knee-deep water and the water was raising quick, and we got up onto the headland and there we were in the pouring, it was raining so hard that pine needles were splashing up into my face as I was hiking along the headland. And in a moment of desperation, we decided that we were going to set up our camp right in the middle of the trail because it was the only open place. Well, we set up our camp. Mine is a hammock strung between two great big, beautiful old growth trees and a tarp over top of that, that was just ringing with the rain.
(12:20): My friend set up a tent that two steps away from my hammock tarp. I could have stepped on his tent. He was that close to myself. And we decided to forego cooking dinners and what have you, and went straight to bed in the dark in the pouring down rain. And we heard against the seawall, what sounded like it was against the seawall anyway, a huge tree against the side of the rocks of the headland on the ocean side. And at first it was lulling me to sleep. And then, it was fascinating me because it seemed to have a very specific pattern and it seemed to be moving down around the headland, but keeping the same pattern. And after a while, Chris and I, we decided we were going to talk about it a little bit. “Hey, do you hear that?” “Yeah.”
This doesn’t seem like the pattern stays the same, but it itself is moving around the edge of the headland. He said, “Yeah, that’s a little unusual.” He says, “I think it’s a tree nearby and the wind is blowing it,” and because the wind is shifting that it just sounds different to us. And no go, no go at all. It kept going around the headland and you would hear, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam. And now I know this headland well. I’ve hiked that coast many a time. It sounded like it was moving towards the interior of the headland. And it kept coming closer and closer and closer to camp until my friend and I were beginning to become a little bit concerned because you would hear bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam against a tree, what sounded like a large tree hitting another large tree repeatedly.
This would happen three or four times in one place, and then it would be quiet for a minute and then happen in another place. And it was getting closer and closer and closer. And finally, it came to within 20 yards of our camp, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam, bam. You would hear it against the tree. And it got so close that I finally screamed out, “Hey, whatever it is, you are out there.” And all went quiet.
And it was quiet for a long time and we heard nothing. I said nothing. My friend said nothing. And then, all of a sudden through camp came something running hard and fast and it pulled the guidelines off of my tarp. So, the tarp started to fall toward me from my left, and I jumped out of my hammock to the right just to hear something crashing across the headland all the way to the other side through the underbrush. And then all grew quiet.
And Chris and I said, about the same time, “What do you say? We pack up and get ready to go?” But we couldn’t leave because the water had risen all around the headland and we were trapped up on this headland with this Olympic tree knocker for the rest of the night. And believe you me, when that sun came up and that tide dropped down, you never saw two fellas scramble off a headland so fast and run back home in your life.
Adam Williams: I’m glad you didn’t get, I don’t know, eaten or whatever in the night. You never saw this thing. This is all…
David Sorrentino: We never saw the creature. What we did see is we had to walk back down through the headland and we saw where bark was knocked off on trees at least eight feet high and level to the ground, which means something had picked up a giant limb part of another tree and was hitting trees at that height, which when you think about it, if it’s an upright mammal like us, that would be shoulder height. So, whatever this Olympic tree knocker was, whatever this Olympic tree knocker is, it stands eight feet at shoulder height.
Adam Williams: So, this story ended up in a film?
David Sorrentino: This story ended up being told to a film crew and then literally 30 seconds of it was used in the movie.
Adam Williams: Okay, was that “Hunting Bigfoot”?
David Sorrentino: That movie was Hunting Bigfoot. Quite the production, quite the production. And so, I was in 30 seconds of that movie if that long, telling just a little blur of that story.
Adam Williams: You obviously are seen as the storyteller. I mean, I started off describing you as a man of stories. You mentioned that you are part of a documentary that’s being filmed now with the local filmmaker, Sarah Hamilton. You’re in this, why do you think people are drawn to you in these stories?
David Sorrentino (17:15): I think because each and every one of us is living through life very much the same. There is a lot of overlap. There’s a lot of overlap between you and I. And what I’m doing is recording it and telling you bits and pieces of what your mind is already telling you. I think that’s what makes it fascinating,
Adam Williams: That point of connection where I hear the story that I don’t know I relate to.
David Sorrentino: Correct. Can I ask you a question?
Adam Williams: Sure.
David Sorrentino: The story I just told you about Bigfoot where, excuse me, not Bigfoot, the Olympic tree knocker. What resonates with you? What did you hear in that story?
Adam Williams: I don’t know.
David Sorrentino: Huh.
Adam Williams: I don’t know. What do you think?
David Sorrentino: That’s incredibly interesting.
Adam Williams: What do you think I would’ve answered?
David Sorrentino: Whether or not you’ve ever thought something like Bigfoot or an Olympic tree knocker could truly exist, and how much of that story am I to take as virtual evidence of the existence of a Bigfoot?
Adam Williams (18:15): I love that. So, one of the things then that stood out to me is that what people’s experiences in stories of such things tend to be this skirting a boundary of man, this thing was here, I have this evidence, and yet I don’t have the concrete evidence that I can put forward, right?
It’s always the photographs you see are always some blurry blob out there in the forest, but there is enough of what’s happening and enough in people’s experiences that you’re like, “Maybe.” Did that spaceship from outer space land? Do we have those outer space aliens? Do we have Sasquatch? Do we have the Loch Ness monster? There’s enough of the stories and those experiences shared that it can keep you going along saying just maybe.
David Sorrentino: Very, very, very, very true. And I balance science with my experiences and I think to myself, “What on earth are the chances that there really is an Olympic tree knocker? What was my experience that night?” Because I didn’t get to shake hands with them. But then again, I know that it wasn’t a hummingbird. I know that it wasn’t a bison, it was something and what was it? And how can it be explained through science?
And I love it when somebody comes to me with the hopes of explaining to me what some of my experiences have been in science. I have on my phone right now a perfectly clear picture of what looks like a Loch Ness Monster off the coast of Port Townsend in Washington state.
And I show that to people and they see it swimming and they go, “My God, that looks like a Loch Ness monster.” But can anybody actually verify that? I have no idea. It’s fascinating to have. I’ve been on a submarine that was attacked by a sea monster and actually got bumped around by it. Please explain that to me. And to answer your question, why did these stories happen to me? I think these stories happen to us all. I just am reviewing them.
Adam Williams: If we go back to the idea of the imagination involved, you are somebody who is experienced and open, I think to if we call it childlike imagination and play and wonder and joy that your father instilled in you, you see life this way. This is the lens that you have on life is to be open to these stories. And a lot of us probably if we’re going through with this great adult concrete logical mind where maybe ignoring a lot of the things that go on around us so we’re not as open to seeing the color that’s out there.
David Sorrentino: That is probably what we would call responsiveness. I’m responsive to when I see the little lights starting to flash that there may be adventure lying ahead and I gravitate toward it.
Adam Williams: I think you’ve lived a number of adventures. Let’s start with you having left New Jersey, going into the Navy. Even I went into the army in part because I wanted something different than just going and getting a job that would put me in a cubicle or doing phone sales or whatever all it might’ve been if I did what might’ve been a more conventional route. I wanted something that would take me around the world, something that would provide adventure, something that was extraordinary. And you joined the Navy, was that out of high school?
David Sorrentino: It was a year out of high school. I did join the Navy and I actually joined the Navy with the thought of being in the construction battalion because my father told me if I learned to operate heavy equipment that I could always have a job. Well, I got into boot camp and I got pulled out of that and put into a camp where I learned how to operate even a bigger, badder piece of machinery, which is a United States Naval submarine, which was so cool. I got to ride around on submarines for years. They are the neatest vehicle you could ever imagine. And if we could strip them of their military power, we could use them to so much good use of discovering our oceans and learning what the world is like around us in its watery existence. But nonetheless, I got to be on submarines and I got to experience the Navy from below decks.
Adam Williams: Was it purely for that functional, “Hey, I’m going to go into the Navy. I’m going to get training. I will always be able to have employment and livelihood.” Or was there some part of you that there was this seeking adventure and thinking, “I’m going to get out somewhere in the world, do something different, get out of New Jersey and see what else is out there.”
David Sorrentino: Multiple parts, and adding to that a real sense of the fact that we were in what we called then what we deemed then the Cold War.
Adam Williams: Right? This would’ve been, was it early ’80s?
David Sorrentino: Early ’80s.
Adam Williams: Okay.
David Sorrentino: And so, my father and my uncles, this was a topic of all time and every one of them had been in the military and it made a lot of sense for me to go, not to mention the fact that two of my uncles had been to Washington State and they spoke of the glories of Washington State, and they kept telling me, “If you can get a duty station out there in Washington state, it will change your life.”
Well, it turns out I did because I was a hospital corpsman in the military, in the Navy, I was stationed out on Whidbey Island, Washington showing up there was the funniest thing in the world because I left the East Coast to go to Whidbey Island, Washington, and I was given permission from the captain of a submarine that I was on to go pick whatever duty station I wanted. A series of events led him to award me that.
And so, I went to the quartermaster in charge of assigning different duty stations and what have you. And I asked him, “What is the furthest most West I can go in the United States and preferably as far North as possible?” And he said, “Well, that would be Whidbey Island, Washington. But listen to me now young man, that place is so remote that we’re going to have to get you there by boat and you’re going to be isolated there all by yourself with a bunch of other sailors on this island. Are you ready for that?” And I said, “I am.”
And so, they sent me and I landed in Everett Washington and I went out and got on a 400-car passenger ferry that took me over to Whidbey Island and the Navy picked me up in a great big bus and brought me to the station of which there was two major towns around us. It was so funny what I thought I was going to go see and what I really did find. I found a beautiful little metropolis out in Washington state when everybody on the East coast thought I was out there sleeping with the elk.
Adam Williams: Was that just a story? Was it a misunderstanding? Was he testing you? What was it he was saying by telling you it’s going to be this desolate, lonely men only adventure?
David Sorrentino: The lack of information. Now that we’ve got information, everybody knows that Whidbey Island is an occupied 70-mile-long place with old carver and everything. The story was in the Navy though. “Oh gosh, you’re just going to be isolated and all alone out there.” Nobody had any way to verify that unless they had actually been there. Before we had actually been somewhere ourselves or a good trusted person has, the stories about those places are magnificent, i.e. Bigfoot, i.e. Bigfoot.
Adam Williams: Yeah. Yeah.
David Sorrentino: Bigfoot popping up everywhere.
Adam Williams: I had some of those experiences myself with the army and you learned eventually everybody has a story about this or that location. For me, one of those was going to South Korea. “It was the worst place on earth that you would want to go,” and I loved it when I got there.
David Sorrentino: Exactly.
Adam Williams: So many people pass along those stories without questioning them or even having knowledge enough to say, “Well, I don’t know. I’ve never been there.” And of course, now, I have internet for people to be able to check into some of these things, but that’s awesome that you said yes, and then you found it to be something else that you loved.
David Sorrentino: I did fall in love with Washington State. In doing so, I basically based my whole entire adult life there. I stayed in Washington state. I predominantly stayed in the same valley, the Snoqualmie Valley of Washington State, absolutely beautiful home of a 250-foot waterfall and I had coffee at the base of that waterfall a lot of mornings.
Adam Williams: Somewhere along the way you would end up in the army as well. How did that happen? How did you start off in the Navy? Have some years there, and at some point, end up in the army?
David Sorrentino (27:20): Strictly by accident. And really and rightfully and truly, so strictly by accident, I ended up in the army. I was a volunteer firefighter for East Side Fire and Rescue, and I worked for station number 74 out of Preston, Washington. And murmurs and whispers started to be falling on my ears that I was doing a pretty good job and if I wanted to pursue a career as a firefighter for the rest of my life, I could. And so, I was due to go down and make application and accept that I would be a firefighter for the rest of my life. And I was on my way down to the station to do just that on the morning of 9-11.
And my captain called me into his quarters knowing that I had been in the military and what have you, and said, “Come into my office,” and sat me down in front of a TV and turned on the news and I watched the Twin Towers fall. And at that moment, at that very moment, I decided I am not going to be a firefighter. My country probably would be better served if I went back into the military. And I said that with every intent of going back into the Navy, that’s the only place my mind went. But when I went down to the recruiting station on the morning of 9-12, there was no Navy recruiter to be found and he wasn’t showing up anytime soon.
And I started to talk to the army guy and the reason why I talked to the army guy is because he had coffee and well, he and I, turns out we were living right up the street from one another up in Snoqualmie in North Bend, Washington. We weren’t far from each other at all. We had a ton in common. He started to tell me about being a scout, and before you know it, I was signing the papers, and all of a sudden, I was in the United States Army instead of the United States Navy completely by accident, but I figured serving is serving and I’ll find some way and somehow to serve here in the army and I did for years.
Adam Williams: If I do the math on that, it seems like you are probably older at that point than typically would be accepted for an enlistment, but with your prior experience, was that the difference maker? Is that why they took you in?
David Sorrentino: Well, there is an actual cut-off age. There is an actual cut-off age that you can sign up by and I think that doesn’t matter prior service or not. And I must have been just under that cut-off age. I think I would’ve been over it. It was September and I would have crossed that cut-off age. Forgive me, I don’t remember what that age was, but I would’ve crossed that age my next birthday, which would’ve been May. So, I was really close to the cut-off, but I tied three of those 20-year-old bucks to my back of my belt and dragged them around all day long. I wasn’t afraid of the physical activity of it.
Adam Williams: Did you go through boot camp in the army?
David Sorrentino: No, they wouldn’t let me. I thought that would be the perfect 12-week vacation, but they wouldn’t let me. They said, “You’ve already been in boot camp.” So, I showed up at the scout office and I was dressed as best I could in my brand-new army uniforms that they had issued me. The only problem was is that I had never spent any time in the army around army guys. I came from the Navy and the Navy has Marines, sleeves rolled up all the way, blouses tucked in, and I showed up as a scout like that and they just laughed their head off. They thought it was a joke. They thought I was playing a game on them.
And so, they asked me questions and every answer I gave was I-I, sir, I-I to that, I-I to this. And they were laughing. They said, no, we don’t say I-I in the army. And I was there for a total of three months when I was awarded a T-shirt that says Sergeant I-I said right across the front of my T-shirt. They didn’t get that I-I business, but they loved it. They thought it was funny.
Adam Williams: There are a number of cultural differences and the rank structure and things like that you would have to adapt to, right? The Navy is the other branch that I had considered and I never went and talked to that recruit. I’ll tell you what, it sounds like the Army’s just good at roping us in. I never even went down the hall and talked to the Navy guy, but that’s one of those things that when I was in places where there were multiple branches together, I never did get a grip on the Naval ranks.
David Sorrentino: Oh, yeah, yeah. It’s so hard, especially when you’re so busy learning so many other things. You start to look at Air Force and Naval and all the different ranks. It gets very confusing.
Adam Williams: Let’s talk about you in cycling because obviously you mentioned the great divide you are dressed with. I mean, you’ve got a cycling cap on your shoes. This is the only way I’ve ever seen you in town. Cycling is such a big piece of who you are now, it seems like. How did you come to that?
David Sorrentino (32:30): I was injured. It was in the military, in the army. I was seriously injured and that injury re-progressed even after I was discharged. I was discharged because of the injury and a medical discharge, but the injury continued to progress to the point where I needed to get some really serious surgery. It was serious surgery. I think it was 14 hours of surgery on my spine altogether where a fabulous, fabulous surgeon put metal rods and 24 big bolts and plates back there to hold me all together, and I decided that I wanted to get healthy as fast as I could. So, I asked the surgeon on my way out of the hospital, “What can I do to get back to running and hiking and climbing and all the things that I love?”
Because you see, cycling, bicycling was the last on the list, the lowest on the totem pole because I was an adult male and I rode a motorcycle and I’ve been doing that my whole entire life and I was a badass and you were way below me if you were on a bicycle rolling along in your spandex, oh my God, how do you even bring yourself to such a place? I wanted to run and hike as high as I could, not bicycle. But I was getting onto the elevator and I was talking to the doctor about this and I shuffled onto the elevator with my walker, and as I’m turning around, he said, “You’re not going to be able to do those things anymore, David, like you used to.” And I said, “Bunk and hooey. I’m coming back to our one-year appointment on a bicycle.”
And he was screaming something, but the elevator doors were closing and it went down and the first thing, the first thing I started to do is, “Anybody got a stationary bike? Who’s got a stationary bike? Bring it over to my place.” I’ve got months, I’ve got to heal from this surgery. Somebody brought over a stationary bike. That stationary bike became my life every day. I would go out to that stationary bike and pedal on it as long and hard as I could, and it got to the point where that needed to go to a real bicycle and it went from one bicycle to the next and all of a sudden my motorcycle sat in the garage dripping oil and being totally unused, and I became a bicyclist instead of a motorcyclist, and it literally, literally changed my whole entire environment.
(35:25): The people I hung out with, my thought on health, my thought on exercise, where I like to go and spend my time, it changed everything about me and progressively I became a fairly dedicated cyclist. I’ve done the Great Divide Mountain Bike route three times that is from Banff, Canada to Antelope Wells, Mexico. It’s 2,750 mountainous miles down the spline of the continental divide. You cross the divide itself 32 times as you wiggle down the crest of it towards Antelope Wells, Mexico, and you’re gathering your own water, you’re feeding yourself, you’re camping, wherever you can find a spot to lay down for the night. It is an adventure of a lifetime and that’s what I’ve taken up, a whole lifestyle based around what can I do on my bicycle and I think I’m happier, healthier, and around happier and healthier people in doing so.
Adam Williams: What is your mindset on being able to tackle such a monumental ride? Why did you ever think that that was possible? That you would go from zero riding to thousands of miles of mountainous riding and say, “I can complete this.”
David Sorrentino: Isn’t that nuts? That’s nuts to think you can do that.
Adam Williams: It takes something extraordinary, I think some kind of belief, to be honest with you.
David Sorrentino: Yeah. What immediately comes to mind is my mindset in doing it. My mindset was as I got up to Banff and I looked down a long pipe all the way to Antelope Wells, and the only way out of that pipe once I got into it is out the other end because there’s no place to turn around. That was my mindset in doing it. What brought me to do that was basically a dare. I was being filmed back in Washington, both in doing things for local food bank, but also in support of homeless vets who were not being recognized. I actually went and gave several large talks to the Seattle Homeless Symposium about this, and one of the things that I announced is that I was going to pedal my bike and told the VA recognized that there were those of us out there who are not being paid even though we’ve been deemed disabled.
And that’s how it all started was me getting out there and saying, if you’re not going to pay me, which they were not paying me, they withheld my pay for quite a long time before I started to get paid, that I was going to get out on my bicycle in a very public way and strain and struggle as far as I can until they recognize that I am out there.
Adam Williams: There’s an interesting push-pull in that of some kind. You’re saying, “I’m going to get attention because I’m a disabled veteran, but I’m going to do it in this way that shows I’m very able.” How did you match that up as the way to show you need to start paying me as a disabled veteran?
David Sorrentino: Because I believe that just because we’re disabled does not mean we are not able. It just means we’re going to find another way to do the same thing, and we are going to try our hardest because we are vets. We’ve been put through the grinder already. We’ve been shown how to overcome mental inhibitions to overcoming physical things. I am 100% physically disabled because of you as an employer, it would be unfair for you to hire me. It would be unfair to you to hire me because so many days I could not give you what you’re willing to pay me. So many days, the pain would overcome me. So, three out of five days I would be way below 25% of my production, but I am a vet. Those two days that I’m working instead of the five, I’m going to push it as hard and as far and as fast as I can go.
Adam Williams: Have you always been a tough-spirited, don’t tell me I can’t do it kind of person? Were you that way as a kid back in Jersey? If somebody challenged you to say you can’t accomplish something that you’re like, “I’m going to show you.”
David Sorrentino: That was the theme of the last moth I did was they told me not to do it. And I’ve never actually seen myself as a person who would openly and willingly defy being told not to do it just for the sake of not doing it. But I think I came to the realization a long time ago, people say, “Oh, don’t do it.” And they’ve never tried themselves. They’ve never pushed themselves. They’ve never seen what could come of it.
As you said, you see me on a bicycle all the time around. I’ve been told, “Don’t do it.” Just today, I was told “Your spine is so beaten up and so broken up that it has to be fixed again. Consider what your activities are.” But I know just several days without movement is way worse than what I am doing with myself right now. What I’m doing with myself right now is I’m supporting my structure and helping it be stronger.
Adam Williams: Tell me what it is about these bikepacking adventures like the Great Divide, and I assume you’ve done shorter ones as well. What is it about all of that that really lights you up in the experience of being out there in the wilderness on your bike?
David Sorrentino (40:00): Well, first off, the wilderness has never corrupted a single individual. So, while you’re out there, everything is very honest. What you see is what you’re going to get. If there are big black clouds coming, you’re going to get a storm, and I love that reality of it out there. On the other hand, you will have the greatest surprises in your life. I came around a corner in New Mexico and I saw dirt flying up behind a great big fallen tree. And so, I quietly lay my bike down and I went and I laid down by the roots of the tree and I looked down there and there was a wolverine, a wolverine. Wolverines are considered the baddest of the bad. They’ll take on a bear. They’re mean, they’re vicious. They have huge teeth and giant claws, and they’ll scratch you all apart. He was digging a hole. I don’t know, maybe he was digging after a mole or what have you.
But he sensed I was looking toward him and he looked up and he stared for the longest time, and then he focused on my face and he did this little backward skitter thing and he looked at me and he ran and he hid. The problem with a wolverine is that his only ability to hide is to find someplace with lots of soft dirt and throw it up in the air so it lands on top of him so nobody sees him. So, all I had to do was watch for the dirt to fly, and I walked over and I got about 25 yards, and I looked at him and I said, “I see you.” And then, I turned and ran. You know what that wolverine did? That wolverine waited until I was all settled down. Then it came looking for me. It played hide and seek, and this went on for 30 minutes.
(42:25): The most vicious animal of all the North American wilderness likes to play hide and seek with humans. That is one thing that I love about the divide is that you get exactly what you see a big storm coming in your face and there is no denying it. On the other hand, you’ll go around another bend and there will be such a surprise that you won’t forget a moment of it for as long as you live.
Adam Williams: I know you’re big on fishing too. Do you fish along the way on those bikepacking trips? Is that part of your source of food?
David Sorrentino: No, it is not. I do not bring a fishing tackle on those trips or I would’ve never completed a single one of those trips. That is a self-preservation thing.
Adam Williams: I understand you’ve been flying for, I mean, 50 fifty-plus years.
David Sorrentino: Yeah.
Adam Williams: I mean, this is a big part of your life as well, and I know that you’ve shared one of these stories on the Moth stage too. It was about fishing. You were supposed to find a minister to get married, and you kept getting sidetracked with fishing.
David Sorrentino (41:15): Yeah, yeah. It was a mistake telling that story. I’m sorry. I wish everybody would forget it.
Adam Williams: Well, we don’t.
David Sorrentino: Half of it’s true.
Adam Williams: We don’t have to recount it here, but the point is I know that that’s just such a big part of who you are, and I’m curious if want to talk about some of that piece because we have cycling and fishing as what sound like just these beautiful out in the wild sort of experiences for you.
David Sorrentino (43:55): Fishing is a far bigger part of my life than cycling. If you count the years, if you count the year, I am 62 now. When I was 60, my brother called me, he says, “David, I’m not wishing you a happy birthday. I never do that, but I do want to congratulate you on 50 years of fly-fishing.” And fly-fishing has been a huge part of what I’ve done. Fly fishing, fly tying, developing advanced ultralight techniques for trout and salmon and steelhead. I was a guide in Washington State for quite a while on the Skagit River where I ran a little jet set and caught salmon and steelhead up there, the Skagit River.
The Skagit River is an unbelievably beautiful waterway up in Northern Washington, and I don’t know how an Italian from New Jersey could possibly find out about the Skagit River, but Lord Louie himself, my father discovered there was this river called the Skagit River up in Washington state where they had fabulous salmon and steelhead fishing.
And so, he calls me and he says, “Davey, Davey, I want to talk to you. I want to come fishing.” I say, “Okay, okay, Dad. You want to come fishing? You can come fishing. “But I want to go to a special place.” He’s yelling at me already like I did something wrong. He didn’t even offer the special place, but that’s how New Jersey people talk and he says, “I want to go to the Skagit River.” I said, “The what?” “I want to go to the Skagit, the Skagit River.” I said, “Dad, Dad, that is an Indian word, and it is the Skagit River.” He says, “Oh, Davey, Davey. Long before the Indians ever found the Skagit, the Italians did.” And so that’s where I got to be a guide was on the Skagit River of Washington State, catching salmon and steelhead and what an experience. Oh, my gosh, it was awesome.
Adam Williams: Did you ever swap stories with your dad? Bringing up Lord Louie has me thinking, wait a second. Did he ever get to know? Has he gotten to know the storyteller that his son is?
David Sorrentino: No. No. Unfortunately, he never did get that opportunity. He passed before that happened. But I’ll be honest with you, the day he passed, I think it was passed on to me.
Adam Williams: That’s beautiful. It sounds special. Is that something that you felt maybe was a need to carry on your father in that way, represent him and his stories?
David Sorrentino: I don’t have to feel a need or try to carry my father on. I feel so much of him. I feel so much of him not just in telling stories, but in so many other ways of how I saw him work, his work ethic. That you loved work, that you loved work, that you loved helping other people. That it didn’t matter who had more or who had less. It was who had the need at the moment. It was many things like this that my father taught me.
Adam Williams: I think that you meet people easily. I think you find it easy to talk with them. It seems like when you’re out on these bikepacking trips and wherever else, you make a lot of friends.
David Sorrentino: Well, if you ever go to the garden, you’ll see every bee meets every other bee and they’re looking for bees of the same hive, and I think that’s all that I’m doing is looking for bees of my same hive. And if you’re not my hive, I’m very curious about the hive that you live in.
Adam Williams: How would you describe yourself in that hive?
David Sorrentino: As one of the worker bees up near the gate, making sure that all the other good bees come home.
Adam Williams: You’re protective for people.
David Sorrentino: I am.
Adam Williams: And you show up and serve.
David Sorrentino (47:55): I never thought of that, but I’ve been in the United States Navy. I’ve been in the United States Army. I’ve been a firefighter. I’ve been an emergency medical technician. Apparently, I like that. Apparently, that’s part of my makeup is to make sure the other bees come home.
Adam Williams: You’ve done those videos for the homeless and for the food banks as well. You’re out there and about for people.
David Sorrentino: That’s true. That’s true. That’s true. I don’t think about it. You’re thinking about it more than I guess I ever have.
Adam Williams: I think about a lot of things.
David Sorrentino: I bet you do.
Adam Williams: Thanks for noticing.
David Sorrentino: It’s amazing how much you’ve thought about just now. You end up with a lot of questions.
Adam Williams: I know a lot of questions.
David Sorrentino: We need a few hours away from these mics to talk more.
Adam Williams: So, I’m always interested in the lessons that people learn, especially when people have so much life experience, and I think about those things a little bit deeply. And I’m curious, what do we have to share with each other as, I don’t know wisdom or if there’s advice, however you want to look at that, but you’ve done so many things, so many big experiences. I wonder if you’ve ever sat and thought, “What are maybe some of those core lessons of your life that you can share?”
David Sorrentino (48:15): I was actually thinking of one this morning. Right back to fly fishing, I have developed a knot that I have been using for most of my life. That knot when tested against any other fishing knot, when in the same wine treated the same way, seems to be so far the strongest knot anyone has ever met. It’s a very strong knot. Now, in talking to a friend of mine the other day, I was reminded once again that you can throw a bunch of spools of thread in a drawer, and somehow, they all tangled themselves and science cannot at all figure it out what the probability of that is. They can tell us the probability of any particle hitting this earth at any given moment. They’ve got math for that. They’ve got math for how fast light moves. They’ve got all kinds of math. But when it comes to knots, they have no ability to determine its probability.
And yet myself, who admittedly has never studied physics or anything like that, has developed a knot that nobody can beat. And the lesson I pull away from that is don’t think about the probability of you doing something or thinking of something or being somewhere that is great because the probability doesn’t matter if you try to do it.
Adam Williams: Have you thought about the, I guess, advice that your father had given you go into construction, you’ll always have that line of work available to you, and you ended up on a different life path, submarines and all these other things. Have you ever thought back on the way your life unfolded and how you’ve been able to sustain this adventurous spirit in relation to what your father tried to set you up for? You seem to have thrived anyway.
David Sorrentino: Yeah, I definitely have thrived in life. I mean, I can’t ask for more. I mean, it’s been unbelievable. But the fact is that I thrive very differently than my father would have had me thrive. My father, although he’d come home with an adventure story today, did not go and live the adventures that I have, and his route would have been a very safe route. My route has been uncomfortable at times, uncomfortable at times, but I think it says a lot more for the fact that our parents can in no way determine the path that we are going to take.
Adam Williams (52:05): So often they’re going to choose the conservative path that provides what is perceived stability, consistent livelihood, whatever they think might be best for us in that way. But there’s so much that’s learned, I think, in being able to be uncomfortable to go through the ups and downs of experiences in the military. You’ve been through a lot of those. You’ve had injuries. There’s a lot of things that have been up and down throughout your life. But what you’ve learned, I would think, is how to persist and how to keep rising above and living these adventures and like we said, thrive.
David Sorrentino: I’m seeing a lot more young people doing that now, the van life, for instance. People are stretching out in different ways that for a couple generations there in no way would we stretch doubt in those directions. But now we are, and I think that maybe I’m 60 and I’m doing what I’m doing, but there’s a lot of 20 to 25-year-olds who are setting down a path where they won’t be working for a particular organization their whole entire life. They’ll be doing many different things. That’s becoming more common.
Adam Williams: I told you when I met you that I’d seen you around a couple of times and I thought to myself, this is a man with some experience and some stories. I’m so glad that I finally have a chance to sit down and actually talk with you, get to know you, and of course, you’re a man of stories. Thank you. Thank you for coming and sharing notes.
David Sorrentino (53:30): Thank you so much. Thank you so much. Very enjoyable. Very enjoyable.
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Adam Williams: Thanks for listening to the We Are Chaffee Podcast. You can learn more about this episode and others in the show notes at wearechaffeepod.com and on Instagram @wearechaffeepod.
I invite you to rate and review the podcast on Apple Podcasts and Spotify. I also welcome your telling others about the We Are Chaffee Podcast. Help us to keep growing community and connection through conversation.
The We Are Chaffee Podcast is supported by the Chaffee County Department of Public Health. Thank you to Andrea Carlstrom, director of Chaffee County Public Health and Environment, and to Lisa Martin, community advocacy coordinator for the larger We Are Chaffee Storytelling Initiative.
Once again, I’m Adam Williams, host, producer, and photographer for the We Are Chaffee Podcast. If you have comments or know someone in Chaffee County, Colorado, who I should consider talking with on the podcast, you can email me directly at adam@wearechaffeepod.com.
’Til the next episode … as we say at We Are Chaffee, “Share stories, make change.”
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