ArVeeNiner
Well Known Member
Well, it's going on two years since the passing of my friend Darryl Hulsey. I had the honor to give Darryl his first, and unfortunately his last, flight in my RV-9A. I haven’t shared this story before because, well, I just didn’t feel like the timing was right. Now that time is marching on, I wanted the RV community to take a look and see how our little flying machines can bring joy to someone.
I met Darryl in about 1980 when he moved in as my roommate during college. My roommate experience changed immediately the day he moved in. Before Darryl, having roommates was all about affording the rent. After he moved in I realized that a roommate relationship can grow into a friendship and bring a lot of joy and fun into your life.
Darryl was the funniest regular guy I have ever met. He was very quick witted and sharp and always had an impersonation or funny routine at the ready. I stayed up many a night with Darryl and his friend Bert laughing until it hurt. I’d like to think of myself as an adequate side kick but Darryl’s personality and talent was so big the most I could muster was a job as his straight man.
Darryl and I lived together for about 4 years. After I graduated, I got my first real job in LA but a year later I got homesick and moved back to the Bay Area. Darryl said he wanted to move out of the place where we were roommates at before I left for LA so I slept on the couch for a month until we found a house to rent.
Unfortunately, a girl, actually another roommate, got between us and this caused some bad blood between Darryl and I and we fell out of touch. It was very unfortunate that he didn’t even come to my wedding a few months later.
But this wasn’t the end of the story. Darryl took his immense talent and put it to good use. He opened a business where he would entertain at children’s birthday parties. He put together very funny shows as characters ranging from Prince Charming, to Austin Powers, to Pee Wee Herman. The last two were pretty much reserved for adult gatherings when he expanded his business to include corporate parties. He sang, danced, juggled, made balloon animals, and just plain old made people laugh. That was his calling and he was a success. One of his daughters ended up helping with the business and became a great entertainer herself. He liked to say that he was able to buy a house because of Pee Wee Herman.
For years I would actually see him in character around the area at festivals and grand openings here and there. I would approach him but he’d always stay in character.
I eventually got back in touch with him via email and tried for years to get together with him. His business was always booming on the weekends and literally never had time to break away and get together.
Then, out of the blue, I got an email from him in the Fall of 2014. We exchanged pleasantries and caught up a bit. He then added a link to his Blog and told me that I should take a look at it.
I was on vacation at the time of all this so I didn’t get a chance to look at it right away but when I finally did I read that he had been stricken with cancer. In true Darryl style, his writings were full of hope and were very light hearted. His write ups regarding his chemo actually made you laugh. He had a talent to turn the most horrible situation into something funny.
His writings were very optimistic. Basically, he said there was an extremely good chance that he was going to beat this. I looked up what he had and I wasn’t finding anything that optimistic but I chose to believe his story.
Back in the 80’s Darryl, myself, and another roommate flew a rented 172 down to Van Nuys for the weekend to stay in his friend’s uncle’s house in Malibu. It was a fun flight, my longest at that time, and we all had a blast. I took Darryl’s sister and her boyfriend flying once after that but Darryl and I had never flown since then. After hearing of his illness I told him that we needed to go on a flight in my RV when he was finally feeling better. He was all for it and I was looking forward to that day when we could hang out again.
Well, a month later he finally realized that he wasn’t going to beat this horrible disease. His odds of making it a year weren’t very good. In my head, he WAS going to make it that year and beyond. Anyway, he still wanted to go on the airplane flight. He called it his Make a Wish flight.
We tried to schedule once but he physically couldn’t do it so we cancelled. We were experiencing some rain at that time so the weather had to cooperate as well. Finally, there was a one day break between storms. He felt well enough to do it so I took a half day off from work and picked him up.
He told me he was on oxygen and had lost quite a bit of weight. I wasn’t sure how I was going to react when I saw him but the same old Darryl met me. He had changed into one of his costumes from his business…a NASA flight suit! That set the tone for the rest of the day.
We had a wonderful time. Even though it was obvious that he was having trouble breathing, we talked about old times, his business, his girls, everything. He was so brave about his illness. He joked about it, which I have to say was a little uncomfortable for me. He was a big SF 49ers fan and it was obvious that they were going to can Jim Harbaugh at the end of 2014. Darryl told me that one of the things that he was regretting was that he wouldn’t be around to see how that all turned out. Darryl just kept everything light.
So we threw his very large oxygen tank in the back and went on about an hour flight around the area. I had three cameras going so that I could put together a fun video for him afterwards. I let him fly a lot and he loved it. In fact, he told me that, although he had gotten an aerobatic ride in a Citabria a few years earlier, his ride in the RV was more enjoyable because he got to fly it.
After the flight it was obvious it had taken its toll on him. He was pretty wiped out. I gave him a hug and told him that I had such a great time and, trying to keep things positive, I told him we had to do this again sometime. He told me that he hoped we could do this again but we both knew what the deal was.
I threw the video together VERY quickly and sent it to him two days after the flight. He and his daughters loved it. I was pretty happy with the way it came out with my limited experience.
Three weeks after our flight Darryl lost his battle and the world became a little less fun.
Anyway, I hope you enjoy the video. I have it posted in two places. YouTube has had some issues with the music but it seems to play fine on Vimeo. Try the Vimeo link first.
Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/127115039
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kMJW-A_J8kM
Darryl Hulsey, 1962-2015.
I met Darryl in about 1980 when he moved in as my roommate during college. My roommate experience changed immediately the day he moved in. Before Darryl, having roommates was all about affording the rent. After he moved in I realized that a roommate relationship can grow into a friendship and bring a lot of joy and fun into your life.
Darryl was the funniest regular guy I have ever met. He was very quick witted and sharp and always had an impersonation or funny routine at the ready. I stayed up many a night with Darryl and his friend Bert laughing until it hurt. I’d like to think of myself as an adequate side kick but Darryl’s personality and talent was so big the most I could muster was a job as his straight man.
Darryl and I lived together for about 4 years. After I graduated, I got my first real job in LA but a year later I got homesick and moved back to the Bay Area. Darryl said he wanted to move out of the place where we were roommates at before I left for LA so I slept on the couch for a month until we found a house to rent.
Unfortunately, a girl, actually another roommate, got between us and this caused some bad blood between Darryl and I and we fell out of touch. It was very unfortunate that he didn’t even come to my wedding a few months later.
But this wasn’t the end of the story. Darryl took his immense talent and put it to good use. He opened a business where he would entertain at children’s birthday parties. He put together very funny shows as characters ranging from Prince Charming, to Austin Powers, to Pee Wee Herman. The last two were pretty much reserved for adult gatherings when he expanded his business to include corporate parties. He sang, danced, juggled, made balloon animals, and just plain old made people laugh. That was his calling and he was a success. One of his daughters ended up helping with the business and became a great entertainer herself. He liked to say that he was able to buy a house because of Pee Wee Herman.
For years I would actually see him in character around the area at festivals and grand openings here and there. I would approach him but he’d always stay in character.
I eventually got back in touch with him via email and tried for years to get together with him. His business was always booming on the weekends and literally never had time to break away and get together.
Then, out of the blue, I got an email from him in the Fall of 2014. We exchanged pleasantries and caught up a bit. He then added a link to his Blog and told me that I should take a look at it.
I was on vacation at the time of all this so I didn’t get a chance to look at it right away but when I finally did I read that he had been stricken with cancer. In true Darryl style, his writings were full of hope and were very light hearted. His write ups regarding his chemo actually made you laugh. He had a talent to turn the most horrible situation into something funny.
His writings were very optimistic. Basically, he said there was an extremely good chance that he was going to beat this. I looked up what he had and I wasn’t finding anything that optimistic but I chose to believe his story.
Back in the 80’s Darryl, myself, and another roommate flew a rented 172 down to Van Nuys for the weekend to stay in his friend’s uncle’s house in Malibu. It was a fun flight, my longest at that time, and we all had a blast. I took Darryl’s sister and her boyfriend flying once after that but Darryl and I had never flown since then. After hearing of his illness I told him that we needed to go on a flight in my RV when he was finally feeling better. He was all for it and I was looking forward to that day when we could hang out again.
Well, a month later he finally realized that he wasn’t going to beat this horrible disease. His odds of making it a year weren’t very good. In my head, he WAS going to make it that year and beyond. Anyway, he still wanted to go on the airplane flight. He called it his Make a Wish flight.
We tried to schedule once but he physically couldn’t do it so we cancelled. We were experiencing some rain at that time so the weather had to cooperate as well. Finally, there was a one day break between storms. He felt well enough to do it so I took a half day off from work and picked him up.
He told me he was on oxygen and had lost quite a bit of weight. I wasn’t sure how I was going to react when I saw him but the same old Darryl met me. He had changed into one of his costumes from his business…a NASA flight suit! That set the tone for the rest of the day.
We had a wonderful time. Even though it was obvious that he was having trouble breathing, we talked about old times, his business, his girls, everything. He was so brave about his illness. He joked about it, which I have to say was a little uncomfortable for me. He was a big SF 49ers fan and it was obvious that they were going to can Jim Harbaugh at the end of 2014. Darryl told me that one of the things that he was regretting was that he wouldn’t be around to see how that all turned out. Darryl just kept everything light.
So we threw his very large oxygen tank in the back and went on about an hour flight around the area. I had three cameras going so that I could put together a fun video for him afterwards. I let him fly a lot and he loved it. In fact, he told me that, although he had gotten an aerobatic ride in a Citabria a few years earlier, his ride in the RV was more enjoyable because he got to fly it.
After the flight it was obvious it had taken its toll on him. He was pretty wiped out. I gave him a hug and told him that I had such a great time and, trying to keep things positive, I told him we had to do this again sometime. He told me that he hoped we could do this again but we both knew what the deal was.
I threw the video together VERY quickly and sent it to him two days after the flight. He and his daughters loved it. I was pretty happy with the way it came out with my limited experience.
Three weeks after our flight Darryl lost his battle and the world became a little less fun.
Anyway, I hope you enjoy the video. I have it posted in two places. YouTube has had some issues with the music but it seems to play fine on Vimeo. Try the Vimeo link first.
Vimeo: https://vimeo.com/127115039
YouTube: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kMJW-A_J8kM
Darryl Hulsey, 1962-2015.
Last edited:
