Alisa Guthrie, 30, brought her husband Christopher Cogle, 36, to the StoryCorps MobileBooth and interviewed him about living with Emery-Dreifuss muscular dystrophy.

Christopher explained that as a student in medical school he learned he could die suddenly of his type of muscular dystrophy. However, thanks to his heart donor, he has about another 30 years to raise a family with Alisa and continue putting his medical expertise to work with his cancer patients.

When asked about meeting Alisa for the first time, Christopher recalled, “I was instantly in love with you. I actually felt like it was irresponsible of me because I didn’t want you to hang your hat on someone who wasn’t going to live.”

Alisa assured Christopher that she wouldn’t want it any other way responding. “I don’t see it as a burden. I feel like I live fully and wholly with you. I thank you for that.”

Different people learn in different ways. Some people flourish in an environment of text books, lectures and memorization while others prefer a more hands on approach. Dignity Project is an organization committed to helping students whose gifts are better cultivated outside the classroom.

In 1998 Dignity Project opened an Auto Academy designed to provide high school dropouts with a second chance. Young people who enrolled at the academy learn automotive repair for future employment. Once donated vehicles are repaired by the participants they are given to disadvantaged families in the Gainesville area.

Robbie Wingard, 16, was the first teenager to work as an intern while he was still in high school. He came to the MobileBooth with Executive Director Gene Tysowsky, to talk about how his life has changed since he began working at Dignity Project.

Inspired by Robbie’s conversation with Gene, two other Dignity Project participants, Dearon Bronson, 16, and Danny Cano, 17, came to the MobileBooth to have a conversation of their own. They talked cars. Dearon described his dream car, the Camero. Danny and Dearon first bonded over their love of fixing up cars. Lately, though they have been discussing the future and boot camp. Both Dearon and Danny plan to enlist in the Marines in the upcoming months. They talked about what it means to be a Marine and about going to war. “I don’t want to die,” said Danny about the thought of serving in Iraq or Afghanistan. He spoke with intensity about serving his country. Dearon hopes to see the world. Both agreed that boot camp will be a challenge.

Jose talked enthusiastically with his mom about Star Wars, ninjas, and his dad and sister. Jose remembered before his sister Esther came along, “I really wanted a little sibling. It could be a brother or a sister, it could be a broster. It could be a mutated kid, but I just wanted another sibling because Dad always had to grade papers and you had to cook dinner.”

Yvette remembered Jose’s childhood career dreams. “You wanted to be a fireman on Monday. You wanted to be a teacher on Tuesday. You were going to be a police officer on Wednesday, and Sundays you were going to be a preacher like Daddy.”

Jose’s career goals have changed. “I think now I want to search for treasure as a pirate.”

Jose was much more decisive about how awesome his mom is. Yvette asked a brave question, “On the scale of 1 to 10, how would you rate me as a mom?”

“10.”

“Why?”

“There’s never been a time when I’ve never had lunch. I always have lunch. And I’m always fed and I’m always taken care of. Even if the week is no TV week… And there’s never been a day when I didn’t have a piece of candy… Because there’s always Granddad.”

However, Jose was not without suggestions for improvement. He was kind enough to outline a six step payment plan to becoming a better mom that included a Nintendo Wii, Guitar Hero, and Star Wars cards with Ventress. Keep dreaming, Jose!

On November 11, the MobileEast team facilitated a very special Door-to-Door recording at the VA Medical Center in Lake City, Florida. I’m somewhat embarrassed to admit that it was the first Veterans Day when I have ever done anything to honor our servicemen and women. But having spent the day with a few of them, I now feel committed to recognize their bravery, sacrifice, and their stories every year.

At the VA Medical Center I heard the story of former World War II POW Arthur Chadwick and the emotional first visit that Robert “Bobcat” Pate made to the Wall, years after his own return from Vietnam and his long journey out of homelessness. I also heard stories from Rob Marietta and Paul Gibson who credit their friendship and their survival to their strong faith in God. Of course, anyone familiar with StoryCorps knows that you do not have to go to a VA hospital in order to hear the stories of men and women who have made sacrifices for our country through their involvement in the military. We hear from fathers and mothers, husbands and wives, daughters and sons, and sisters and brothers who have all been affected in some way by their own service or the service of a loved one. Sometimes the first conversation these men and women have with loved ones about their experiences during times of war take place in a StoryCorps booth. No matter what those conversations reveal, what pride or pain, what sadness or joy, it is an honor and a privilege to help those conversations take place.

Of course, it takes more than mere opulence to keep my interest, so I began to explore the neighborhood and found myself in the midst of a strange and beautiful nexus of old and new; the Southeast Residential Historic District. One of Gainesville’s oldest residential communities, the Southeast Historic District has its origins in the 1854 incorporation of the city. There are a significant number of Queen Anne style homes which served as residences for downtown merchants and professionals at the turn of the century. The area also has a cluster of bungalows and period revival homes which date from the 1920s. As Gainesville expanded so did the southeast community. During the 1880s it grew east from Sweetwater Branch with the surrounding areas used mainly for orange groves.

The Southeast Historic District of 2008 is a a study in contrasts. Our current digs are one example of the obvious wealth that has returned to the area but that wealth has yet to usurp the neighborhood from the more modest and, in some cases, ramshackle homes that find themselves side by side. The southeast side is the home of the Alachua County Public Library, where the MobileEast’s beloved airstream is currently parked, the Matheson Museum, and its also the once (and hopefully future) home of the Cotton Club.

Gainesville boomed after World War II as veterans, thanks to the GI Bill, enrolled at the University of Florida. Many of these new students were from other parts of the country or were well traveled due to their service in the military. They were fans of the popular music played by the African American bands and vocalists of the day and when those artists came to the Cotton Club via the chitlin circuit, they drew music lovers both black and white to the southeast side. “Cotton Club is one of my favorite stories in the whole world,” says activist, storyteller, and recent StoryCorps participant, Vivian Filer. “I know that we’re all familiar with World War II. Well, they had to build the army camps around the country, and in Starck, Florida they built Camp Blanding. This particular building that we’re using now [and calling] the Cotton Club was built on that site. After the war ended and [the federal government] sold those buildings off and the Perryman brothers bought a building and brought it to Gainesville. Their idea was to use it as a theater on the east side of town for African American citizens. We did not have a theater on the east side of town. This is 2008, we still do not have a theater on the east side of town. But at that time that concept didn’t go over as well as they expected it to do so they closed the theater after a couple of years.”

The next owners of the building were Sarah and Charles McKnight and they had a slightly different vision of how it could be used. The McKnights opened the Cotton Club in the early 1950′s and it soon became one of the early performance venues for well known artists like Cab Calloway, Duke Ellington, Ray Charles, Ike & Tina Turner, Jimi Hendrix, Gladys Knight & the Pips, and The Isley Brothers. The McKnight’s had big plans for the Cotton Club which included structural additions to better accommodate the ever increasing crowds. While the club existed during the time of segregation in Gainesville, you wouldn’t know it when you stepped through the front door. The audience was made up of folks from as far away as Ocala, Palatka, and Jacksonville and it was a favorite spot for many of the faculty and students from University of Florida. It is, perhaps, the popularity of the Cotton Club among the University of Florida football players that lead to the club’s demise. It is believed by some that the presence of the whites at the club, in direct conflict with the segregation laws of the time, was the reason the city chose not to renew the club’s license. Vivian is part of an effort to reclaim the building and to help the Cotton Club live again as a community and art center for the 21st Century. “Historically the east side of Gainesville has not been the side of town that has received the accommodation with infrastructure, with new ideas, with business, with all those things that make a thriving community. We can’t rehab it because it was never ‘habbed’ in the first place,” says Vivian. “We want to make sure that what ever we do holds on to what the history is but plan moves forward. When the hall itself is finished it will seat 350 people in auditorium style with a stage there.”

The Jewish community in Florida is largely stereotyped as a legion of Northeastern bubbies and zeydies transplanted to the warm, south Florida climate. However, the swampy wilds of north Florida have been home to a growing Jewish community for hundreds of years.

Jewish communities have thrived in the American south since the late 17th century. According to the Goldring/ Woldenberg Institute of Southern Jewish Life, until the 1820s there were more Jews in Charleston, South Carolina than New York City. Many Jews got their start as peddlers, roaming south from the northeast to sell their wares.

Up until the 1960s the small Jewish community in Gainesville comprised much of the merchant class operating department stores, pharmacies, even a Gator gear shop selling University of Florida souvenirs. Barry Baumstein and Howard Rosenblatt reminisced in the MobileBooth about the stores that used to line Main Street. Baumstein’s grandfather owned Ruddy’s Department Store on the south side of Main, his father owned a shoe store down the street, and his Uncle owned a men’s clothing shop. There was one tiny synagogue in town.

Jewish Gainesville has grown considerably since Barry was a boy. There are now a few synagogues, as well as a new Hillel building which serves the largest Jewish student population in the country. However, most of the Jewish owned stores of the 1950s and 60s are gone. “A lot of the Jewish merchants pushed their children into professional or academic fields,” explained Rosenblatt.

While Gainesville’s Jewish community has boomed, many formally thriving southern Jewish communities have dwindled in size. The community in Dothan, Alabama, just twenty miles from the Florida border, has diminished so drastically that recently the community started a “resettlement project” offering Jewish families $50,000 to move south. Tempting.

For more information on Floridian Jewish History and the Southern Jewish Experience check out the Southern Jewish Historical Society and the digital archives at the Institute for Southern Jewish Life.

Alachua County Commissioner Cynthia Moore Chestnut did the honors by announcing the official proclamation before stepping into the booth with her son Christopher.

“What did it feel like touching death?” Alisa Guthrie asks her husband, Dr. Christopher Cogle.

During his medical fellowship, Chris remembers walking quickly with other fellows from a lecture hall to the hospital. Chris had a pacemaker. “Being shocked by a pacemaker feels like Mike Tyson or Mohommad Ali coming up to you and punching you in the chest. It’s so powerful it drops you to your knees. It could happen at any time.”

“I felt like I was walking too fast for my body and suddenly, I got the boxers punch and fell to my knees.” Chris tried to play things off. He got back up and boom, he was shocked again. He fell to his knees. The other fellows asked if they could help, but Chris said no. “I was so embarrassed; embarrassed by my body and my inabilities.” Chris was shocked 23 times. Finally, someone took him to the emergency room. A week later Chris woke up in the hospital. “You died and you’re back,” said the doctor. They had turned off his pacemaker. That was beginning of the end of his old heart.

Chris has Emery-Dreifuss (pronounced: em-uh-ree dry-fuss) Muscular Dystrophy. Muscular Dystrophy (MD) is a genetic disorder that weakens the muscles that help the body move. As muscles weaken mobility is gradually compromised so that certain things we take for granted, sitting, walking, jumping, running, become increasingly more difficult for people suffering from MD.

“As a kid, I knew that I was different from other people,” says Chris. He is average height; handsome with big brown eyes and and a youthful voice. To me he looks and sounds like a typical 36 year old, perhaps even younger than his 36 years.

“I realized I couldn’t run as fast. I dreaded potato sack races,” explains Chris. “For the first ten years of my life, no one knew what it was. I was told, I had ‘contracted heel chords.’ I would come home from school and my parents made me stretch my ankles for 30 minutes.”

“Denial does have it’s benefits,” says Chris. “I overcompensated. I remember as a boy, trying to come to grips with muscular dystrophy, I would actually go outside in my backyard, out of eyeshot of my parents, and I would try to leap into the air and fly like Superman. There was a couple of times when I was in the air for more than a second and I actually felt that I could take off. I think there was a point in my life when I was given the option of succumbing to what I had or the choice was to fight this thing.”

Chris fought.

In the hospital, Chris remembers when the doctors told him they had found a heart donor. “I was feeling very cold, very depressed, and I remember them telling me, ‘Good news we have a donor, but the donor is older.’” The donor was in his sixties and the doctors couldn’t guarantee how long the donor’s heart would last. They told Chris that he had two minutes to decide about taking the heart. “It was probably the hardest decision, and my answer was no. And the doctor said, ‘Well you do realize that you could die in the next couple of days?’ I still felt like I had to take this gamble.”

Two days later, the doctors came in and said that a young person had died in his twenties and this young person wanted his heart to go to someone who needed it. I was very sad because again someone had died.” But Chris accepted this new heart.

“How are you living your life differently?” asks Alisa.

“I think of the donor everyday. I feel a sense of urgency that I never felt before. I only have about 30 years with this heart. This is the challenge of being Superman again. I’ve got 30 years to fly. I work everyday of the week but we also take a month off for vacation. I have no apologies and I don’t ask my employer for permission. I am living for two.

“If you could say something to the donors family, what would you say?” asks Alisa.

“I would say thank you. From the deepest part of my heart, thank you.”

“When I was about 30 we were together at the house [she and my dad] have in Homosassa and it was just a miserable weekend and I felt our relationship was awful. And I told her right before I left that I couldn’t deal with that kind of criticism anymore and it wasn’t helping me. She said that’s what mother’s do and who would tell you if not your mother. I told her I didn’t need a mother anymore I needed a friend. If she wanted to continue to try and be my mother that way that I didn’t want that, but to call me if she wanted to be my friend.”

“I kind of, almost, didn’t expect to hear from her because she could be a little stubborn. It’s kind of a family trait. I think about two weeks, though, after that conversation I picked up the phone one day and a kind of small voice said on the other side;”

“Hi, this is your friend.”

“And it was. And we stayed friends until she died. With only occasional lapses and critical judgment, but I think I had my lapses too.”

Frances was a frequent volunteer and in the early 1960s she developed an interracial prayer group in Tampa, Florida. Frances was determined to keep the group going despite threats of cross burning and other violence. Frances was invited to go to the church of one of the prayer group members who was African American. There was a special event taking place at the church and Frances happily agreed to attend. The event was a speaking engagement at which Black Panther Party for Self-Defense co-founder, Huey Newton, was speaking. He gave an inspiring and incendiary speech that was filled with calls for uprising. In her typically outgoing fashion Frances walked up to Mr. Newton after the speech, took his hand in her’s, placed a small aluminum crucifix in his hand and said, “This is for you. God loves you. Jesus loves you and so do I.”

Click here to view the embedded video.

I am sitting in the booth on our first full day of interviews. The sun is shining, as it does constantly here in lovely Florida,? and a slight breeze is blowing when two UF students walk past the booth. This is what I hear:

“What is that?” A blonde in flip-flips and short-shorts points to the MobileBooth.

“Oh,” says her tanned and muscular friend, “that’s where you go to talk about when you first realized you were a Gator.”

Our stay in Gainesville began with a roaring, or should I say growling, start. After opening day at the Harn Museum, we were invited by WUFT to the Gator Growl, the largest student organized pep rally in the country. It was so large that both John McCain and Barack Obama sent a videotaped address to the UF crowd. We became acquainted with Albert and Alberta Gator, we sang the UF alma mater, we even learned the Gator “chomp.” Steve Miller Band played, and the moment I first realized I was a Gator was right after they played “The Joker,” when the fireworks began. Let the Gator GROWL!