I’ve always loved live music! This is Marla at a Rolling Stones concert. I’ve been fortunate to see U2 and The Ramones in a small club, James Brown, David Bowie, The Jackson 5 (Michael Jackson lifted Marla onto the stage from our first row table to dance with him in Las Vegas), YES, R.E.M, Stevie Wonder, Santana, The Eagles, Neil Young, The Grateful Dead, Lady Gaga,The Jefferson Airplane, and the New York Philharmonic Orchestra. We saw Prince, Pavarotti, Psychedelic Furs, and Public Enemy. I was mesmerized by John Coltrane at the Jazz Workshop in San Francisco. The list goes on and on!

My sister Patty, Suzanne and Stephen saying goodbye to us at the St Peter Port Airport on the island of Guernsey. We visited almost every year. I suffered through driving on the left side of the road.

One year my niece and nephew visited from the Isle of Guernsey for their first venture. We drove the family from Denver to Northern California to visit my mom and give her our station wagon. I convinced everyone to go on a run with me. It was a brutally hot July day, but we all made it!

At a party during Heimtextil in Frankfurt, Germany.

In 1994 Marla had severe breast cancer with multiple cancerous lymph nodes. We luckily found a great doctor and the treatments began. She underwent 3 surgeries attempting to find clear margins, regular chemo and then an experimental stem cell transfer at UC Med. It was a high-dose chemo treatment with a 1 in 10 chance of dying just from the treatments. Huge portals were put in her chest for the special chemo. She didn’t want to do it, but Lisa, Stacy and I begged her to proceed. It sounds like a melodramatic TV show, but on the eve of her high dose treatment we had all the major family company stockholders come into her special germ free ward decked out in medical garb and masks. Marla wanted them to sign a “stockholder buy-sell agreement” which they had been dragging their feet on for 5 years, never liking the terms, but Marla said to them….“Just change what you want…BUT sign the DAMN thing because I don’t want my family to deal with this if I don’t make it!” Ridiculous! She made it and there were radiation treatments as well. It was a tough, scary, and brutal time period!

The next year, 1995, her prognosis was cloudy at best, but the docs said she could travel overseas. She wanted to go to Bali and Thailand, areas her parents liked. The photo is Marla on Wat Arun on the banks of the Chao Phraya River in Bangkok. Her hair is starting to grow back. She said to me with tears in her eyes…“This is the first time in a very long time I can say…I’m back!” This was the beginning of our love affair with Southeast Asia.

With the Girls and sons-in-laws at Game Creek Club on Vail Mountain. 

The older grandkids together at our showroom at the Denver Design District.

Travel has always been a huge part of our lives, personally and professionally. We’re enjoying a glass of rose Champagne in Villefranche sur Mer on the French Riviera. We are fortunate to have visited over 41 countries and 20 major islands.

A fabulous dinner with brother, Gary, and Marla at my mother’s home in Pleasant Hill. We’re dining on our favorite raviolis from Genova Delicatessen in Walnut Creek, always very special to us!

One year 17 family members came together from as far as New York City at the Mauna Lani Resort on the Big Island.

My special little sweethearts!

Stacy, Mom, and Lisa, three beauties!

I worked at Wesco Fabrics for 49 1/2 years, a huge part of our life! In our peak years we had warehouses in 4 states and over 23 showroom affiliations in the U.S. as well as Singapore, Hong Kong, and Guam. At one time we were importing decorative fabrics from over 25 countries! Click on these 2 blog posts for more info: https://gentryconnects.net/?p=9647 and https://gentryconnects.net/?p=9744.

A fun part of our Wesco Fabrics’ journey was venturing into furniture, decorative accessories and antiques for the Denver showroom and warehouse. This post will tell you more about this fascinating adventure: https://genCtryconnects.net/?p=9295

Two of our competitors offered incentive sales trips, so we came up with our own unique trips which were very different from them! Marla was a former teacher, so she added an educational element to the adventure. It was fun taking clients to places totally new to them like Thailand, Bali, Singapore, the Amalfi coast, a medieval French chateau, Paris, and the French Riviera. This post tells the complete story: https://gentryconnects.net/?p=9560.

We sold the business to RM Coco in 2017. I almost had to drag Marla to the closing as this was a difficult decision. We retained our warehouses which we eventually sold. Our daughter Lisa took us out to dinner to help celebrate the occasion.

We took our grandsons to visit Southeast Asia in 2019 and in 2023. These were without question my two very favorite travel experiences.

My running gave way to cycling due to knee injuries. It has been a joy ever since! I love riding around the world and have taken 25 cycling trips in Europe.

My two most difficult athletic events: the “Escape from Alcatraz Triathlon”….and summiting the tough Col du Galibier in France. The “Escape” was beyond scary as I was not a swimmer and definitely not in open water! For the “Galibier” I started riding when it was quite warm down in the valley and by the time I reached the summit it was freezing rain! I couldn’t feel my fingers on the descent. I did this ride twice over the years.

We love making scratch pancakes and waffles with the entire family!

I wouldn’t call myself a collector, but I do love the hunt for the unique! I think Marla would change my middle name to…“tchotchke.”

Some of my favorite things in addition to being with my family: Walking on a beach, exploring exotic locations, photography, and beautiful islands.

It is always a joy to connect for dinner with friends!

Everything changed in our life when Marla was hospitalized on 4 occasions in 2021 due to heart failure! We were faced with a brand-new scary paradigm. We were blessed to have an incredible team of doctors, nurse-practitioners, nurses…. lifesaving meds! We developed a new lifestyle blueprint of healthy low-sodium eating, exercise, and optimism. As I’ve said many times Marla is a true force of nature! In reality I wouldn’t be here today without HER!

And…in 2022 “warrior Marla” climbed up the steep hill to visit the Parthenon in Athens. The heat adversely affected her heart meds, but she did it!

Our amazing family is always paramount!

It feels really nice to make the Big 8 Zero! Yes, more gray hair and wrinkles…but this is a wonderful time! Marla and I will relish 2024 with high spirits & optimism, a colorful outlook, and always with an attitude of “Carpe Diem”, or as the Roman poet Horace once wrote…”seize the day”. What an amazing journey!!!

Photos: Dick Gentry. Not to be used without permission.