MUSKEGON, Mich. — School spirit comes in every shade. But a feathered brown cap and a big yellow bus are the colors that define Randy Fortier.
“Never thought I'd be doing this job," said Randy. “Lo and behold, here I am.”
Retiring after 30 years with the paper mill, he looked for a new reality. What he found instead? A dream.
“I look forward to getting up in the morning and going to work. I miss it when I'm not here," he said. “I just see the parents in what they go through with the special needs kids, and I just want to let them know that I take good care of their kids."
Students seeking an uneventful trip at Reeths Puffer High School best find another ride home.
“Sometimes I sing too or we, we play the radio. I'll go back and just talk to 'em. And, and sometimes we dance. I suppose on a regular bus, they'd probably call me crazy," said Randy.
“I just give 'em love, you know, and you get it back 100 fold."
Patty Harpster, director of bus services, assures us nothing in the job description includes Randy's above and beyond work.
“Very proud to have him work here," said Patty. "We're getting compliments from the parents and everybody is just so happy we have him.”
"You need to be an everyday hero to work here," she smiled, "And Randy is definitely one of them.”
Crystal Haynes, mom of 3, couldn’t agree more.
“You could be having a bad day and you see that guy and he just makes everything so much better," said Crystal.
Crystal’s daughters, Destiny and Gabrielle, both ride Randy's bus. When they're wheeled down the driveway every morning to his bus ramp, they kick their feet in excitement.
"Knowing that your kids are in good hands, that's a big important thing," said Crystal. "He's like a gift from God.”
But that gift from God, once cursed with loss of his wife.
“I was 70 years old at the time, we were married for almost 48 years. And I thought that was probably the end of things," said Randy.
Then the man blessed with a bus full of students lost one of his own.
“I always thought I was a tough guy, you know, and I had a thick skin, but I also lost a grandson," Randy said, through tears, "to suicide."
“He’d come home and he’d bang around all the pots and pans, making his meals for the week. It kind of irritated me. Well, when he was gone. That’s the first thing I missed. All that banging around, all that noise. It was gone," he said.
Nothing could fill the empty seats in his life. But the packed rows? They help.
“It's made me look at life a lot different. Life is short," said Randy. “I’m 76 years old now. And it's just, just gives me meaning.”
Life made all the more meaningful by his new copilot.
“Shortly after my wife had passed away, she I found out she lost her husband a year before that. And she just told me if there was ever, anybody I wanted to talk to, she was available," Randy explained.
“We started visiting and going out to dinner and talking and here we are married 10 months,” smiled Annette.
His bus aide turned wife, Annette.
“He's hilarious. He keeps me laughing keeps me going," she said. “Makes my day every day.”
The man with a brown feather cap, now riding off into the colorful sunset on a big yellow bus.
“I just never dreamed it would go this way in my life. But here I am," smiled Randy. “I'll do it till I guess I can't do it anymore."
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