James Willsey

My Love,
The world hasn't stopped for my broken heart,
a year of tears and heartache has come and gone.
With each passing day I miss you more than the last.
Forever loving you and holding you in my heart
until we are together again.

Anna

Jim and Mikey have been friends since their teens.
Mikey fudged his birthdate and began driving over the road when he was 17 years old.
He continues to do so with a brief break while he lived in Vegas, a shared love of Jim's and Mikey's, Vegas. 

Back in the day Mikey took about all of the "gang" cross country. Nothing to do? hey grab a ride with Mikey to California seemed to be the motto of the time.
Jim often told the story of his and Clark's trip to California with Mikey and how I loved hearing it every time.
A few of my favorite highlights,
Arriving outside of Salt Lake City Jim and Clark were in awe of the view of the city as they crested a mountain. Mikey had seen it a million times and inspite of Jim and Clark's desire to get out of the truck and be in civilization Mikey needed to sleep.
Mikey settled in for much needed rest while Jim and Clark left the truck to explore their mountainous surroundings.
They climbed a steep mountain slope, the climb was arduous as the rock was shale like and slippery,they perservered up the rocky terrrain and after much effort arrived at the top and were rewarded with a wonderful view of the city from this vantage point. They rested and loooked around only to find nicely made steps going down the mountain that had they only looked around a bit they would have seen them and simply walked to the top of the mountain.
Along the way they grabbed handfuls of sage brush, having never seen or smelled this before they thought it was very cool and wanted to bring some along with them. Jim and Clark along with handfuls of Sage brush climbed back into the rig to await Mikey's awakening, well that occourred very quickly when Mikey was awoken by the "stink" (as Mikey called it) of the sage brush. Mikey, who was very grumpy having been awoken  in this manner sprang out of the bed grabbed the sage brush and threw it all out the window, all the while yelling at Jim and Clark for bringing it in the truck.

Somewhere along the trip Mikey was getting tired but did not want to pull over to sleep. They were on a section of highway that Mikey traveled often and knew it was a straight stretch for many miles, requiring no shifting just easy cruising, so he had the brilliant idea of letting Clark drive. Now those of you who knew Clark are thinking "was Mikey out of his mind" Jim definetly was thinking this and said so but Mikey and Clark would have no part of Jim's concerns.
Without stopping or missing a beat Clark climbed into the driver seat as Mikey climbed out all the while barrelling down the interstate. Soon Mikey was sound asleep and Clark was in his glory, Jim was beside himself! Lo and behold the best laid plans often have kinks in them and such was the case with this plan.
Major construction was being done on the interstate, oops.
Clark didn't know how to shift a Mack truck so on they went at full speed thru the construction site, thankfully it was idle so no workers and little traffic.
Clark had to keep the truck between concrete barriers with only inches to spare on either side of the rig. Jim and Clark saw no reason to wake Mikey because there was no way he and Clark were going to switch out under these harrowing circumstances.
After several miles of white knuckle driving they cleared the construction with nary a scrape on the rig. Aw yes one of Clark's more finer moments indeed.

Mikey and Jim had lost touch through the years as Mikey's home was in California where when on the rare occassion he wasn't on the road he lived with his wife and children. I knew about Mikey as Jim had a knack for telling me stories of his friends and their adventures. To this day I feel like I knew every single one of his friends before I met them and I cherish the stories and being able to share them. Even if I never met some of them I feel as though I know them.

When New York State introduced Quick Draw Jim, whom always not only liked but needed mathmatical challenges, began calculating the best way to bet, how many spots, how much to wager, how to "read" the board etc...
One night we got a call from Mikey, Jim and he had not been in touch for years. The two of them began talking about Quick Draw, Mikey had been fascinated with Keno for years and was anxious to get Jim's input, and so began the renewal of their friendship which remained strong until Jim's passing.

Mikey stopped over the road trucking for a time and lived in Las Vegas for several years. Jim would travel to Vegas several times and stay with Mikey. When I would travel to Vegas with Jim we would meet up with Mikey and spend time together. In the above picture Jim and I were picking Mikey up and bringing him to our room in Aria, Mikey had a brief break and spent it with us.

Mikey and Jim spent countless hours on the phone with Jim trying to convert Mikey to a craps player and Mikey trying to convert Jim to a Keno player. Mikey can indeed read patterns and has hit for thousands of dollars. As a matter of fact Mikey took a casino for substantial amount at the Keno machines, when he returned the next day those very machines were gone! I don't know but Jim and I liked to say "yep they took those machines away beause Mikey took 'em down on them! " :)

Mikey stays in contact with me and I am honored to recieve this text:
"On Holy Ground" Mikey always texted this to Jim (no matter the time, day or night)whenever Mikey entered Nevada. A love of Las Vegas shared by both of them.