Leave Your Mark with Vince Cortese

Amputee / Pro Bowler / Speaker & Comedian - Mike Bolland

• Vince Cortese • Season 3 • Episode 101

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Embark on an extraordinary journey with Mike Bolland, a congenital amputee who defies the odds and transcends barriers with his remarkable resilience and ingenuity. Born without a right hand in Montclair, New Jersey, Mike's story is a testament to the power of perseverance and creativity.

From his early years in beautiful Hazlet, NJ, where he attended Beers Street School, to his family's relocation to Arizona at the age of eight, Mike's life took unexpected turns that would shape his remarkable trajectory. It was in Arizona where Mike's journey into the spotlight began when he landed the role of Danny in the movie "The Trial of Billy Jack." While initially drawn to the glitz and glamour of the movie industry, Mike quickly realized that his casting was not due to his acting talents, but rather his unique physical condition.

Undeterred by the challenges he faced, Mike's resilience only grew stronger with time. At the age of 13, he embarked on a bowling journey that would change his life forever. Introduced to the sport by a friend, Mike quickly discovered a natural talent for bowling. By the age of 16, he clinched his first state bowling title, propelling him onto the national stage and earning him a coveted spot in the Coca-Cola Nationals in Washington, D.C. This opportunity marked Mike's first real taste of independence and success away from home.



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This is Leave Your Mark. I'm Vince Cortese, and today's guest is Mike Bolland. A congenital amputee has made remarkable strides besides being born without a right hand. Mike's journey is as inspiring as it is unconventional, including his unexpected entry into the world of pro bowling. and the creation of his innovative Two Fisted Drinker Beer Month. Mike, thank you for being my guest here today. Thank you so much for having me. I appreciate it. Now, you have literally, uh, just an incredible variety of experiences in life, and you're a cancer survivor as well. And I want to get to that in a minute, because to hear your journey up to that point, You're quite the remarkable man. Yeah, you, you take life, uh, full head on, and you make everything work for your benefit. And I need the audience to hear what makes you tick, and how you got to be this incredible individual that you are. So, thank you. You're born and raised, or you're born in Montclair, New Jersey, and then in Hazlitt for a little while, and then you wind up in Mesa, Arizona. Uh, parents, Joe and Mary Baldwin. Uh, dad was a machinist and mom was a homemaker. Now, based on your story, I want to slow down right here, because these are two special individuals. You're the middle child of three, and share with me what your mom was like. My mom was an Italian, and she was a very, very strong willed person. I give her a tremendous amount of credit for the person I am today, as my brother and sister also do. If you think about it, in the mid 60s, when I was born, there was no ultrasounds. My parents were suddenly Given this one handed little boy and they were very determined to make sure that I was no different than anyone else. And I had a very good upbringing. So as far as my mom was concerned, great cook, strong personality, very good leader. And I shouldn't say good, fantastic and great leader in my life. How about that? Now, Dad was a machinist. Was he a tradesman? Yeah, he was a machinist his entire life. I always wanted to go tag along with him because I like working on cars and motorcycles and things like that. For whatever reason, he didn't want me to tag along with him to his place of business. But he did that for many years. But we shared a lot as far as like working on, you know, Cars and motorcycles, like I said, and to this day, I'm very fortunate that I still have some of his tools and I own a car that I bought in 1981 and I still find myself using some of those same tools and thinking of my dad when I use those tools. Now, you're in the middle of three children, your sister, Anita. And your younger brother, Mark. What was life like? Now you, you went over to Mesa, you were in middle school still or grade school? I was in grade school Okay, so your childhood years are beyond getting into the teen years, you're in Mesa. So, and then myself being from the East Coast, I lived out West a little bit, that's a pretty big change, especially for somebody at that age to go coastal. So share with me what that was like when everybody went over to Mesa. Well, we really didn't like it. You know, to be honest that we were very, very much loving New Jersey. We especially Haslet. I went to a school called Beer Street School. We had a place called Tiny Glen's and we shout out to everyone from Haslet. Really great area to grow up in and I still remember so much of that area. So many some so many great people that grew up there. So we really didn't want to move out. But when we got here just like anything else, you know, we've made do and you know, my parents also had to find a place. to get prosthetics. That was an additional challenge for them. They had no idea. There was no internet for them to look things up, but they did a great job. And we ended up, to be honest, loving Arizona. It was the best move for our family coming out to Arizona. Now, when you go out to Arizona at that age and you don't have a hand, are you wearing a prosthetic at that point, or how are you dealing with this? Cause I mean, I don't think life is any more sensitive than those years just prior to being a teenager where we're just kind of getting used to being in our body. And we don't know who we are just yet. No identities come out and you have this as serious a situation as it can get for somebody that age. So, what was going through your mind? To wear a prosthetic back then. I wore a prosthetic until I was about 12, I believe. Roughly 12, when I kept breaking them, to be honest with you. And my parents asked if I wanted to get it replaced at that time. And I said, no, because I was really on and off with them. But at that time, I probably, you know I don't know, 50 percent of the time. And I just figured in my life at that time, I didn't need one. And as far as my story, my story is maybe a little different than others. I don't want To represent everyone that was born without a hand. Because I've just never I've never thought of it any differently, and I think it's because of the great parents and the great family I have. I never thought about myself any differently than anyone else. I actually like the way I am, and I like having one hand. This is the way I was supposed to be But again, I don't want to represent others. I know others have had many challenges because of how they were born, and it can be difficult. be that young with the peer pressures and the kids not saying nice things and that nature, to find an inner peace. I mean, we have people that go through their entire lives that never find that place in themselves where they're comfortable in their skin, who they are, and how they're going to address life. So, I mean, at a young age, you're like, I don't need the prosthetic, I'm going to get on with life. And you're moving through your high school years, so, uh, you take up bowling, and, you know, I mean, it sounds kind of odd, because the whole idea, you know, you're going to use your fingers on the ball and everything like that, you do have another hand, but it's still one of those things where, how are you being skewed, like, uh, you know, what does the coach think when you want to come out and play bowling? I was fortunate. I had a friend that asked me to join a bowling league, and when I say fortunate, I mean it. I guess I possess some natural talent, but I also possessed a determination to practice and put a lot of time in. My mom would drop me off at the bowling alley, I'd bowl 50 games a day. And again, it was just one of those things that I was so driven to be as good of a bowler as I possibly could. I was, able to win my first state title, a scratched title, by the time 13 and I won my first state title when I was 16. It's your perfect game. yeah, I have a few perfect games. Yeah, yes. you eventually go on to be a pro bowler, which is, you know, Hollywood's probably trying to steal your story. Wasn't that, uh, Woody Harrelson and Kingpin? Wasn't that this, they had similar storyline as yours? Yeah, it was definitely a one handed bowler. I think he lost his hand at I actually haven't seen the movie because it does kind of parallel my life a little bit. And they didn't even ask me to be in the movie. I kid around about that. Yeah, I don't mind. But yeah, it was definitely about a one handed pro bowler. But it was fun. I really had a great time on tour. I cashed on National Tour. My highest finish in any PBA event was second. I came in second in a regional event in California. But more than anything, what I wanted to do was become the first one handed and or amputee professional bowler. And I was very fortunate I was able to do that. How long did you bowl for professionally? I pursued that for about five years and the thing about the tour, just like anything else, you know, you have to have a backer and I had backers or most of the time I tried to back myself and it just could be a very difficult life if you're not, if you don't have that backer to really make sure that you're out there and getting, you're comfortable and not thinking about having to cash, putting pressure on yourself. So I was on and off for about five years. So now you're at Mountain View High School, the Toros, and you also write for the school newspaper. And you have some unique interests. Uh, you like helping others and volunteering and working out, and you love sports. So, how does life progress through high school there and you're about to graduate and get out into the real world? What was going on then? I really enjoy sports. I'm glad you brought that up. I still, to this day, I play a lot of golf. I play basketball, which I think is more of an age thing now for me, but I still, I still like basketball. I can dribble with both, they say hands, I only have the one, but I can dribble both sides. Sports has just been a big part of my life. I've built myself some prosthetics, I guess is the best way to do it. So I can do the curls and presses and things like that. It's been, athletics and being active has been a very big part of my life. And I really enjoyed writing for the school newspaper. Actually My senior year, I was also the school photographer, which was fun, you know, for the high school, for the paper, and that was my passion. That's what I was really going to pursue, but I decided midway through college that I was going to instead join the Pro Bowler store and give that a shot because I knew that was more of a young person's decision to try to do that, and that's what I did. This is incredible. Now, what I love about you is this is your strong spirit and your approach to life and when we're looking at as life progresses for you, um, now you mentioned that you had aspirations where you like, um, doing stand up comedy. And you, I mean, you've got quite a variety of things going on. And then besides the comedy was the, uh, podcasts were not stumped that you created as well as, uh, you're, you're having other inventions. So how, what is the process of, after you're out of school, how did things begin to play out early in life? You're what, in the nineties at this point? Yes, it was, it was the 1990s and there was a period of my life where I went to work for a corporation and I worked at Corporate America for 25 years, the company for 30 years. Are you okay with me bringing up the Yeah, that's fine. Sure. It was Discount Tire. They don't have any locations where you're at, but there's quite a bit of locations and not to jump ahead, but there was a great career. I really enjoyed it. But. Having cancer, like I know you went through really when I got to be a little later in life, that's when I decided, you know, there's some things that I want to do in my life and leave my mark like you're exactly doing with your podcast, which I really like. It makes you think what's my legacy going to be or what do I want to give back to mankind? And that's why I decided to do what I'm doing currently now. Well, just to kind of touch back on it, you had a career, 25 years. And that sounds like that was influenced by your experience when you were youth with your dad. Yeah, my brother was already working for Discount Tire. And an interesting story, if you don't mind me sharing about that, that has to do with me having one hand. One of the things I'll say about being born the way I was is, and I know that a lot of people go through this, employment can be difficult. And it was for me at many times. Points of my life, including Discount Tire. And I don't say it in a bad way. Discount Tire, when they interviewed me, they didn't bring up the fact that I had one hand until the last gentleman that I interviewed with said, do you think you can change tires with one hand? And I said, yes, I think I can. He said, okay, here's what we're going to do. We're going to put you at X store. We're going to that is a negative but I look at that as a positive because at least I was given the chance to prove myself and at the end of the day, let's, let's be honest. I mean, tires on a vehicle. If, if I couldn't do the job, I would be putting people at risk. So that wouldn't have been fair. So I worked in the stores for five years. And then I reeducated myself and talk about the college and things like that. I did this on my own, but I reeducated myself to build websites. So I was able to move up to the organization and run our e business department, our digital marketing area. And then when I decided to leave the organization, I was running the customer experience portion of Discount Tire. Wow. 25 years later, so you could have been, you could have run the place. Oh, I don't know about that. We, we had a, we had a great founder, Mr. Holly, unfortunately he passed away in 2018, but boy, he was, and he's, the company's still strong and doing well. They have great leadership there. Yeah. Well, I mean, you learned the skill sets on being entrepreneurial. You go boots on ground first, and you come into that title and none of the way, it sounds like a bit of the adventure you had. Exactly. Connect with us on LinkedIn, be our friend on Facebook, follow us on Twitter and Instagram. You are listening to Vince Cortese. We just want you to leave your mark. you go from that, so. After 25 years of being there, how did you find out you had cancer? It was really, I'm going to say I lucked into it and it sounds kind of crazy, but I had throat cancer. I was driving home from, we have a, if you know, Arizona, we have a place in Northeastern Arizona, a cabin that we frequent. It was 4th of July, 2016. And I had an itch on my neck. We're about 20 minutes away from getting home. It's a three hour drive from where we live to where our cabin is. 20 minutes from getting home. And I just had an itch in my neck and I itched it. And I was like, man, I have a lump there. And my, my wife goes, well, you know, you should get that checked out. Of course me, you know, I'm like, yeah, I should, you know, the person, yeah, I better get that checked out. Kind of forgot, you know, wasn't really top of mind for whatever reason. And then I was at a vendor dinner about a week later and I've turned and I could feel something in my neck. It's like, oh, that feels kind of weird. And I was like, yes, I better go get that checked out. the pain was strong enough for you to realize it was serious. something wasn't right. Now, as a cancer survivor myself, what was your first thoughts when you were told you had cancer? Yeah, it was devastating. You know, I had a, I got a call on a Friday when I was in my office, and I remember you try to prepare yourself because as you know, you go through the biopsy and you go through the PET scan, you go through a lot of those tests, and you try to prepare yourself for that call, hoping it's going to be good news, but trying to think through what you're going to do. And I remember telling myself, take, have a piece of paper, take notes, Make sure you get down everything they say. Well, you know, I'm gonna, it's gonna be hard. It's even hard for me to talk about now but, when they called, uh, I wasn't able to do that. It was just, it was just too hard of news, you know. When you go through, when you are told that news, it's just devastating because you're, Your life flashes before you, I guess. And I don't know what to say, you know, that's the way I think of it. I think of my family, my wife. At the time, my mom and dad were still alive. There was just a lot to process. So what I did, I went down, my brother works for Discount Tire as well. I went down to his office and I said, Mark, I was just diagnosed with cancer, um, kind of a basket case, basically, and we called the, the doctor's office back, and he was able to really take the notes and figure out where we were going next in that journey. So I thank him very much for that. Now, after finding out, how long did you decide to address the situation and what did you do first? I, I decided immediately, we were, Discount Tire has a nurse on staff, like a corporate nurse, and he really helped guide some of those things and get me to the right people. And I really appreciate that. Dr. Jordan Weiner here was an ear note, ear throat and nose specialist here in Arizona. And I was recommended to him and he did a great job of the care. There was, there were, there were a couple, as you know, a couple options, right? You can go through the chemo or my, these were my options. I can go through the chemo or get the surgery. He recommended surgery because he thought that would have been the best way to get it completely out. And then if they didn't get it all out, I'd have to go through the radiation. So I chose the surgery and, and I, and then I ended up going through the, the radiation as well. It was very evasive as you can imagine, as I'm sure you, you more than understand where I'm coming from, but it was the right decision for me. Now, um, was it localized or did it spread that you had to have the cancer treatment or the chemo treatment? They were afraid it did spread. So that's why they did, I didn't do the chemo, I did the radiation, but they were afraid it did spread. They weren't sure whether they got it all. They took out 45 lymph nodes and the tumor was the size of a golf ball, they said. And it's amazing to think that something can be in your body that big and you don't really even realize or you just kind of hit it. You know, it's not like I hit it when I was shaving. It was just, Oh, uh, yeah. That's an area where it's shaving. You hit it frequently. Now, with it being life threatening, you'd had managed at this point in your life, quite a bit of struggle. And is this any different? And why? This was much different from my personal story. This was, I actually have a story I can, I can share. Please do. after, on that Friday, get home and I tell her my, my oldest daughter at the time was going to Northern Arizona University, NAU, and my youngest daughter was going to Dobson High School here in Mesa. My daughter, my oldest daughter, happened to be in town from from college. So I was able to tell my wife, and together we were able to tell my daughters, and that was, you know, I, as you know, some of the roughest things is telling other people, well, my wife goes, well, you know. What do you want to do Now, I mean, a little later in the evening, I said, you know what, I feel like going out for a glass of wine or four, right? You know, it's like one of those, like I, I just need to, I need to get away. So we went to a local restaurant and where we happen to sit, we sat in the bar, nice restaurant, nice Italian restaurant, but we sat in the bar. And I go to sit down and it's interesting when you have one hand people or any amputation or maybe other things, you know, as I walk through the restaurant, people look at me. I don't care. I love having one hand. So I'm very comfortable with that part. But people assume they know what's wrong with you by saying, Oh, well, I see what's wrong with him. He has one hand, but that was the first time in my life that that wasn't what was wrong with me. What was wrong with me? was I had cancer. And it, that hit me like a ton of bricks when I was sitting there with my wife. And then here's what it really made me realize more than anything. I may be guilty of that too, looking at someone going, hey, I know a little bit more about that person than maybe I really did know. I don't. None of us know the personal struggles that people are going through just based on their appearance. And that was a very good lesson that I learned that day. I'm not going to say I was a bad guy before that, but I think I was better after that. Now, that being, what did you take from that, then, moving forward, as far as how you internally were dealing with your emotions as they were come up, come forward? I'll just say it was difficult. Again, you know, I can't personally compare the two. The cancer to the, to being born with one hand, the cancer was just a lot more devastating to me and, and let's face it, I mean, people lose limbs because of cancer, so they, they, they may have a double whammy. I was just someone that would say just, but I was born with one hand. It was, uh, I had over 50 years of experience there, but I had no experience with cancer. But one of the things I did, and I don't know if this is. I didn't read this anywhere, I don't know if this is a best practice, but what I decided to do was get some goals for myself on the other side. That's kind of how I thought about it, meaning that when I beat this, What do I want to do? And there's two things that I wanted to do in life. Number one, I wanted to go back on tour and bowl one more tour stop. And I still haven't done that, but I, I will do that. I, I will do that. Now I'll go over on the PBA 50. That's kind of the neat thing. I get to go, I get to go on the senior tour. Yeah. But number two, I wanted to try stand up comedy. And that's really why I did it. Because I always wanted to try it. And when you are dealt a hand that you don't know when that, I love saying that, if you don't know when the, if you're not guaranteed tomorrow, which none of us are, but you really get that slapped in the face when you have a diagnosis of anything major, including cancer, you realize that, you know what, tomorrow is the day or the today is the day today. If I want to try stand up comedy today is the day to do it. So, that's why I tried it. So, would you say that the cancer experience has brought you a greater urgency for life? Yes, it absolutely has, and that's why I decided to move on from my career at Discount Tire, which I very much enjoyed, to do other things, including the podcast, and I really thank you for mentioning that podcast. It's the We're Not Stump Podcast, and what we do, what I do, is I interview other amputees and hear their life stories and get their other side, and I've learned so much about that. My mission after that, when I, when I came through all that, was to try to give back to a community that I had been a part of, but I really didn't participate in, if that makes sense, being, you know, a person with one hand, just living life, enjoying life, not necessarily caring. Again, personally, okay with it and enjoying it. Other people's stories are different, but I wanted to give that back to that community. Any way I could, and the We're Not Stunned podcast is one of the ways that I try to do that. Yeah, it's very nice. I would, uh, we'll have a link on that at the end or in the description so that people can hear it because it's a great podcast. Now, you've got about how many episodes? getting close to 50. I've been doing it about a year and a half now. Okay, so the podcast is fresh and new. So, um, I want to talk to you about some of the different things that you've done here as well. You also founded a non profit. Share with me what Helping Hands is about. It's all about. trying, again, in my mission or my life journey, my north started to help other amputees, I founded a non profit called Joe and Marie Boland's Helping Hands, and the inspiration for that is my parents. The people that provided me with prosthetics when I needed it, I thought there was no better honor to them than for me to name a non profit after them. Not only did it give me the opportunity to wear prosthetics and have prosthetics when I needed to, but they also gave me the ability to choose whether I wanted to have one or not. And there's many, many reasons. amputees that choose not to have it for whatever reason in their life. But for the ones that do choose, it can be very difficult. Insurance can be very inconsistent. The cost of prosthetics are quite astronomical. So we just try to do our part with the cost, but not only that, the resources needed. Whether it be support groups, whether it be introducing them to people like them so they understand their journey, we try to do whatever we can to support other amputees. Now, what are you currently doing besides the podcast and some of these organizations that you've set up? Well, primarily what I really enjoy doing, even more so than the comedy, even though I enjoy comedy, I'm not going to say I don't do that. But what I do right now is a lot of speaking, and I really enjoy the speaking. And what I do, and you're giving me an opportunity to share, and I can't tell you how much I appreciate this, and I thank you so much. What I try to do is share my perspective as a transcriber. One handed person and maybe some of the lucky things that happened to me as opposed to some of the unlucky things. Like, I was lucky and blessed to have parents like I did. I was lucky and blessed to have my brother and sister, my family now, my friends, you know. There's a big support group that makes all of this possible, that makes me look good, I guess is a good way to put it. I mean, your ability to have that inner strength and the courage to see the situation through. So many of us, um, we play the hand that we're dealt, and we get upset with what we're dealt, and then we kind of, we become our own worst enemies. And that doesn't seem like anything that ever happened to you, even as a child. And dealing with those pressures of other children or juveniles, you know, that can just be so hurtful. The words are piercing, and they're long lasting. So, to come battle tested as you have, realizing that you came from a strong core with your mom and dad, Yours is an incredible story and journey. I mean, I have to do this. I want to just name, because you, I'm going to say speaker first, because I didn't have that one written down, but it's a congenital amputee. You're an athlete, a comedian, an inventor, a nonprofit founder, a podcaster, a bowler. And a child actor, and I, I mean, I didn't go through all, I mean, so, to say that you're living a full life is an understatement, you, you are drinking it up, you know. So the idea then, that leads me to this point, in the podcast, where, how would you like to be remembered? How would you want to leave your mark? The way I'd like to leave my mark? is someone that really inspired other amputees to live their full life. To realize that there is another side, as I even talk about, as I've talked about here. That understanding that we're all human, and That's something that comes out a lot in the podcast. A lot of the things that we go through as amputees, and I'll lump myself into this, we have a feeling of alone, because I'll go to a Phoenix, or Arizona Cardinal game, Phoenix Cardinal, That was 30 years ago. Like an Arizona Cardinal game, I'm a season ticket holder, and I'll walk around, right, and I'll be the only person like me in the whole stadium. It's natural, but I'll tell you what, you know, that's part of the human condition. There's a lot of times anyone feels like they're alone. And I think if we overcome that feeling of alone and, you know, Bring other people into our lives. Our lives could be even more fulfilling. That's beautiful. Mike, you're truly an inspiration. I want to thank you for your time and coming by and sharing your story with me today. I can't tell you how much I appreciate being on your podcast. You have a fantastic podcast and the guests you've had on and the stories that you're sharing are making an impact in people's lives. So thank you. I appreciate that, Mike. You're, you're a big contributor to that.

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