He was my hero. He was in Senior High and I was in elementary school. I had such a crush on him. He started on the baseball, football and basketball teams. He excelled at all sports but basketball was the big one! On Friday and Saturday nights I would either be at his games or listening in my room to KWNO, the local radio station that would broadcast all the local High School games. I couldn’t wait to get to the end of the game when the scoreboard was announced to hear how many points he had scored. “Whetstone had 18 points, Whetstone with 22points,†and on and on. He was my cousin, Michael Whetstone. My mom is his Dad’s sister. I had 4 amazing cousins. Michael (the oldest), Patty, Darlene and Dawn. Yep, he was the only boy in a very female dominated family. We spent every holiday, Christmas Eve, Christmas Day, Thanksgiving, New Years Day, Easter, 4th of July, etc with them. It was just the way things were. It was perfect as far as I was concerned.
His senior year in High School, he was a big reason that Winona Senior High went to STATE for basketball! Now, those of you who didn’t grow up in a smaller town probably don’t understand what it means to “go to State.†Basically the whole town shuts down for a few days and you are issued your orange and black wardrobe (our high school colors) so that you may be assimilated properly into the fold. Churches pray for the team, lunch specials are concocted in honor of players, and everyone knows of someone who is going to be playing in the game at STATE. Carloads of people stream out of town- one after the other filled to the brim with stickers and flags, and pom-poms and pillowcases. The joke is
that the last one out of town is in charge of shutting off the lights.
Even though they lost their first game in the State Tournament, they came back to a town parade as heroes. They were among the best. They had made us proud.
After High School he was recruited by a few NFL football scouts and tried out for the Denver Broncos. He didn’t make the team, but just to get to try out was very impressive. He played football for NDSU from 1980-1983. Three year starter at offensive tackle and offensive guard. He earned All-NCC honors in 1982 and 1983 and was named to both the 1983 Kodak and Associated Press All-America first teams. He was first team All-America offensive guard for the team when they won the 1983 NCAA Division II national championship. I still remember watching that game on national TV and seeing his smiling face and stats come up on the screen. I was so proud of him. He’d really made it.
When his college career was over he served as a student assistant and volunteer coach for the football program at NDSU.
After my graduation from high school, I went out on the road with a band. I came back for my cousin Patty’s wedding in the summer. Michael was there, of course. Before the wedding we got to talking and I told him about my new gig as a backing vocalist for Lamont Cranston. I had been “discovered†singing with a cover band in the Twin Cities by someone from the band and they’d asked me to join on the spot. I’ll never forget the look on his face. “Lamont Cranston?†he said. “I know THEM! They’re huge! Wow! I’m proud of you. You’ve really made it!†And in that moment, looking up into his beaming face, with the sunlight raining through the trees, on that little church lot in Minnesota City, amidst a sea of tuxedos and chiffon, I felt for sure that I had.
Shortly after that I moved to London, England.
In March of 1988 he was diagnosed with cancer. It seemed impossible: this big strong young man, so full of life and energy, who seemed capable of achieving anything he set his mind on, suddenly had cancer? Surely someone had made a mistake. But it was no mistake. They found a tumor the “size of a football†(that’s how they put it) in his chest. I read and re-read the letter from my mom in disbelief. I felt so far away and completely helpless. During that summer I stopped off in Minnesota on my way back to England after playing a concert in Tokyo. My family and all of my cousins got together at The Mississippi Queen, the BIG bar in Winona. I was talking with Michael, who had been going through chemotherapy and we were playing pool. All of a sudden, some locals started harassing him, making fun of him because he was bald (from the chemo treatments)! I wanted to go over and knock ‘em down I was so enraged. But Mike just looked at me and said, â€Don’t worry about them. Those kinds of things really don’t matter. Just let it go.†He had a big smile on his face and a peaceful calm look in his eyes. Still my hero.
In the fall of that year I wrote him a letter. In it I told him how much I’d looked up to him all my life and how when I was in elementary school I’d had such a crush on him. I can’t remember much of the details of the letter, but I know it was heartfelt and I was very sad writing it. Still, I was so far away and unable to get to spend any time with him. He was living in North Dakota then and had been assisting the football team up to that point. I was in London wishing I were back home. In December my mom called me to tell me that Michael didn’t have much time left. I called him from London the first week of December. This is what I remember from that conversation. He was watching “Rudolph†on TV. He thanked me for the letter that I’d sent him and said it was really sweet. He thought it was cute that I’d had a crush on him when I was 11 and reassured me that it wasn’t weird! I told him that I was coming home to see him and he said, “You don’t have to do that!†To which I replied, “Well I really want to so I am.†We talked for quite awhile and then he told me that he wasn’t afraid to die. He said he was ready and he wasn’t scared. Those were the bravest words I’d ever heard out of anyone’s mouth my entire life. Still my hero. Saying goodbye was hard but I was confident that I’d be seeing him very soon.
He had taped an inspirational message for the NDSU Bison football team prior to their 1988 National Championship game with Portland State that December. During the game, which Michael watched on TV, they dedicated the game to him. The whole team wore armbands in honor of him. The taped message was played for the team before the game. They won!
Three days later he passed away.
My mom called to tell me. She said that my cousin Dawn (herself a great singer) had sung “Freebird†(his favorite song) to him at his bedside as he was fading away. I took some comfort in that.
Even all these years later I still miss him and think about him. And I wonder if he knows what an important influence he had on my life. And when things get too rough I think back to that phone call and his voice telling me that he was ready to go. I can’t imagine what strength and courage that must have taken. Still my hero. Always. One good angel…
Okay. So here are some things I’ve decided I could never live without in no particular order. And really just for my own sake, in case I ever lose my memory. Andy Gibb -
