WESTOVER AIR RESERVE BASE, Mass. -- If you ask most young children what they want to be when they grow older, the sky’s not the limit – it might seem endless to them. Some might want to be a baseball player, doctor, dentist, or an astronaut.
No matter who they might become in life, there’s opportunity in every waking moment of our lives, and two Patriot Wing NCOs recently collaborated on a video that encourages the notion of seizing the day that’s in front of you. The result is a video, made in nearby Northampton, that’s pulled in more than 1,000 views on YouTube.
A teenager in the 1980s, Senior Master Sgt. Shane Robitaille, 439th Force Support Squadron, grieved the death of a young friend. The precious idea of life’s valuable time led Robitaille and some of his teenage friends to create a tape to serve as a time capsule. Each said what they thought their lives would be like in 20 years.
The video got its start when Robitaille, on his way home from work in 2015, remembered this tape, and where his life had taken him since the 1980s. He was a single father with two daughters; not exactly what he had envisioned when he taped his future aspirations as a teenager.
At that time, he wanted to make movies.
“When I was young, I thought of growing old and what my life would mean to me. Would I have followed down my chosen road, or only wished what I could be?” Robitaille, who’s always enjoyed music, heard some lyrics from a song titled, “Kyrie” by the 1980s band Mr. Mister, which instantly inspired him. He decided to write a poem entitled, “Lucky Day.” He eventually would produce the video with the same name.
Staff Sgt. Andrew Jourdan, who works with Robitaille in FSS, read Robitaille’s poem. An aspiring musician, he decided to turn Robitaille’s poem into a song. Jourdan said reading the upbeat poem changed his life. In turn, Robitaille made him a deal that if he put in the hard work and made it happen, he Westover team turns inspiration into reality would collaborate with him and turn the song into a music video.
In Lucky Day, a young man meets himself as an old man. The old man isn’t happy with the way the young man is living his life and he pulls no punches telling him why. “Imagine meeting yourself 50 years older. What would the older version of you say to you?” said Robitaille.
Jourdan’s work with the song impressed him so much, that soon it became apparent it needed to be shown through a video. Eventually they created the video to go along with the song. Robitaille and Jourdan put together a team of actors and a videographer to film and edit the music video. They spent two days filming in downtown Northampton, Mass., and another month editing it into a 6-minute music video.
Although the evolution from poem, to song, to music video took place in what seems like lightning speed in the reserve world of just a monthly UTA, there’s more to the story, given Robitaille’s background in the Air Force.
“Mentoring in the Air Force needs to take place outside the two-day UTAs each month,” he said. “You get out of it what you put into it,” he said.
This video can be found on Youtube at https://youtu.be/ OzeltymzZPs