Right now, there’s an older man staying in one of the rooms of the hotel who has been here just about 3 weeks, almost all of November. He came in with another older guy (both about 70ish) with long, shoulder-length white hair. They talked, etc, etc, and I started talking to the long-haired, hippie looking one, and found out that A) he’s the founder of KellerWilliams, a substantial real estate firm in Michigan (he’s a millionaire, several times over), and he’s ran marathons on every continent, including Antarctica.

The reason he was here (he lives in Grand rapids; the long-haired one) was because his friend (John) recently bought a house and was fixing it up. A few nights later, I stayed up talking to him, and found that he had no plans to live in his house he was fixing up. After bringing down boxes of photos, he told me that he used to be a very, very wealthy man as well. He had been invested very heavily in Michigan agriculture in the 1950s and 60’s before being deployed to Vietnam, and had established a fertilizer company with a friend of his that he had met in the military: Regis Philbin. Using Philbin as a spokesperson, he had product placement left and right, and with his high-school sweetheart, they had purchased a home in Michigan, one in New York, and one in Fort Lauderdale, along with an impressive sailboat to travel from one place to the other.

John and the long-haired man have been friends for decades, almost 1/2 a century, and the long-haired man keeps especially close tabs on John because his wife died 10 years ago, and John had a mental breakdown, sold all of his houses and his boat, travels around the country buying and fixing up houses, then gives them to his friends. I heard John speak about the best filet mignon he’s ever had, with his personal cook serving it to him in the Harbor of New York City, his family next to him. We have a similar routine now: insomnia, coffee, and thinking about travel.

Oh, also, I’m going to New York City in about 3 hours. Boom.