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About The daily Astorian. (Astoria, Or.) 1961-current | View Entire Issue (Nov. 16, 2017)
7A THE DAILY ASTORIAN • THURSDAY, NOVEMBER 16, 2017 Crew: ‘I would like somebody who will not get seasick’ gave up after experiencing the workload, quitting right there on the water. “I do think there’s a dif- ferent breed of people now,” Dunn said. “In all my years of working, I never heard of someone saying, ‘Nope, I’m done.’ You take a new guy out and at the end of 18 hours, he wants time off. Well, that’s not the way it works in this industry.” Continued from Page 1A of running a boat and fish- ing have gone up, while the ex-vessel value — what fisher- men receive for their catch — has remained stagnant. Some permits are harder to obtain now. In fisheries with fishing quotas attached, many fishermen hold on tight to their quota, making it difficult for new entrants to even get on the water. Some of the traditional channels for new fishermen are closed or closing. Gillnet- ting, for example, used to be an easy way to get started on the Columbia River. The gear can be fished by a single per- son and the initial, upfront investments were relatively low. Now, the gear itself has spent years under intense scru- tiny with legislation to move gillnets off the river’s main stem entirely. Fishing — a job based around resources that live in environments in constant flux — has always been a high-risk job. To Dunn, it seems that more people make their calcu- lations and decide the risk isn’t worth it. “There was maybe a day when you could say, ‘Hey, I want to do this and eventually buy a boat,’” Dunn said. “It’s just a dream anymore.” Fishing is also a field that ends up more of a calling than anything else, many fishermen say. “It’s a hard job,” said Hugh Link, executive director of the Oregon Dungeness Crab Commission. “It’s very fulfill- ing if you get into it and you’re good at it — and you tough it out.” “You usually either love it or you hate it and there’s not much in-between ground,” Corbin said. Finding crew In the Oregon Dungeness Family wage Colin Murphey/The Daily Astorian Troy Malcolm and Dave Strickland work on equipment in preparation for the next fishing excursion on board the Ash- lyne at the Warrenton Marina. crab fishery, crews begin work on gear early, well before the season’s traditional Dec. 1 opener. In the late summer and early fall, posts start to prolif- erate on a Facebook page for West Coast commercial alba- core, tuna and salmon fish- ermen. Captains write that they’re looking for crew. Peo- ple looking for crab boats to work on post to the group’s main page and list their qual- ifications, or lack of. Craigslist ads go up around the same time. The ads and social media posts get passed around, friends tag other friends. Sometimes a success- ful hire results. Or sometimes people just bicker and joke in the comments. The internet — particularly Craigslist and social media sites like Facebook — has become one way captains find crew and potential crew find captains, but it hasn’t replaced word-of-mouth as the most reliable, and often preferred, method. Commercial crabber Brian Boudreau prefers to hire guys he knows, or who know peo- ple he knows. As long as he has one experienced crew member, though, he doesn’t mind hiring someone who doesn’t have experience. In fact, he’d almost prefer some- one without experience over someone who has been on a hundred boats and thinks they know everything. In Boudreau’s opinion, reality TV shows about the industry have overstated the workload, the boasts of 70 hour days. Still, the longest stretch he can recall without much of a break was 54 hours long. It certainly isn’t the job for everyone, he said. “It comes and goes,” Dunn said. “It seems like you cruise along with the same crew for a while … then the tax man gets them, or drunk driving, and then all of a sudden you have a problem.” One of his crew members has been with him for seven years now. Dunn consults with him when it comes to selecting a new crew member to make sure it will be a good fit, but a new hire really only needs to know “up from down,” Dunn said. “I would like somebody who will not get seasick,” he said. “The rest is teachable.” For untested — “green” — crew there’s no easing into the work. Once you step on board a boat, you have to be ready to go. “There’s no working at half speed until they get the hang of it,” Corbin said. But both Corbin and Dunn note that recently they’ve had new crew members who just To Link, Corbin and others, fishing remains a viable career option. In August, Gov. Kate Brown signed a bill into law that will create a task force to focus on maritime sec- tor workforce development. The Oregon Dungeness Crab Commission worked with the committee that presented the bill. Eventually, the law will make it so maritime jobs from fishing, working on tug boats to maritime construction have a classification, opening up other resources from the state’s employment division to people and employers in mari- time fields. As Link looks ahead toward high school job fairs, he knows fishing jobs may not be on every student’s radar. But, he said, “They need to know about these opportu- nities, and I don’t think it’s the first choice for everybody right away … unless it’s in their family.” He points to people like Corbin who have turned it into a career. “I think people might have their own impressions of what working in a fish plant or working on a fishing boat is, but we want to teach them the real-world experiences,” he said. “It can be a family wage job and it can be very reward- ing for somebody to get this opportunity.” Winn: Ted’s fitness helped with his initial battle with cancer Continued from Page 1A tissue. He wants badly to beat it, not just for himself, but for his wife and two children. Maybe, for you, too. Even as doctors are now telling him he may not make the weekend. “You know it’s not good,” his wife, Sandi, said, “when the oncologist gives you a hug.” ‘Life of the party’ Both of Ted Winn’s children play lacrosse. Cooper is 16. He’s observant and thoughtful. He also plays nose guard on his high school football team. He’s watched out for his mother since he was a little boy. Rylee is 13. She’s in eighth grade and plays soccer. Those who know Rylee say she works hard to be successful in everything she attempts. She’s a perfection- ist. Combined, they are perfect reflections of their mother and father, who met while students at Oregon State and made a life together. “He was life of the party,” Sandi said of her first impres- sion of Ted. “He’s a super social guy. Everybody knows him.” It’s part of how he rose at Nike, going from answering phones and replacing defective products in 1995 to footwear testing and then to the direc- tor of social media. Employees there tell you Ted would start his morning at work by going desk to desk, greeting every employee in his department. These days Ted makes breakfast for his family in the morning. It’s a simple thing. A husband, a wife, and their two children. Brain cancer attacks all over, though. His mem- ory is foggy. For a while, he couldn’t remember what day it was or even how to figure it out. For a time, he kept sneez- ing, always in twos. He had a painful bout with hiccups that lasted two weeks. And in one year Ted spent 26 weeks in the hospital. But these days, the cereal, waffles or eggs and good conversation is good glue for the Winn family. Ted asks how everyone slept. Then, the conversation turns to school assignments, tests and after-school activi- ties. It’s the little questions, like “How was practice last night?” that act like bonding agents, pulling the family together for a few minutes before they scat- ter for the day. “That fills his tank,” Sandi said. Winn graduated from Asto- ria High School in 1987 and is in the school’s hall of fame for basketball. The Winn family roots for Oregon State. They love the Trail Blazers, too. And there was joy this season in baseball, when the Los Angeles Dodg- ers, who Ted pulled for as a kid, made a run to the World Series. Steve Garvey was Ted’s favorite player. In the NFL, he pulls for the Rams. Sports have always been a part of the hub in the Winn family circle. Manag- ing the social media accounts of the world’s leading sports sneaker and apparel company put him right where he always wanted to be — at the center of the sports universe. But now being in control of things, even little things such as breakfast, feel important. “When it comes to being sick like this,” Ted said, “I’ve been like a passenger. I don’t like to know the gory details. Knowing the details doesn’t help.” The details he prefers come at the breakfast table on those mornings. School is waiting. A doctor’s appointment before lunch. There are plans to be made, and Ted also spends part of his day writing short notes to his children in the event he’s not there for the special moments of their lives. But that breakfast table features big moments he is there for. It’s laughter, and love, and an ugly condition such as CNS Lym- phoma doesn’t get a seat at the table. “I want more than anything to get back to life,” he said. “I want a sense of normalcy.” Asleep at his desk Ted was at his desk on the Nike campus in the spring of 2014 when a colleague appeared in the doorway, and just stopped cold. Ted was asleep. “That was so unlike me,” he said. “I wasn’t someone who could sleep even when I wanted to take a nap and all of a sudden I’m dozing off at work? I just looked up and saw my co-worker in the door and was like, ‘How long have I been out?!” He was also confused, his wife said. Ted’s speech was slow, too. In a matter of days, what doctors hoped might just be pneumonia turned into a battery of tests and scans. Then, a scheduled surgery and a scramble to find a neurosur- geon and oncologist. Ted’s closest friend, Erik Viukola, remembers the ini- tial phone call with the awful news. Said Viukola: “It’s Ted on the phone and he’s using an Arnold Schwarzeneg- ger accent. You have to know Ted to get that. He says, ‘Erik, bad news. I have a brain TOOM-AH.’ That’s how he is, joking around. had just been a nap. She’s in it. So are their children. Also, friends, neighbors and family. “When the cancer came back, I just said, ‘(expletive),’” said Sandi, through glassy eyes. It returned twice, in two places, six months apart. And now the plan is to try experi- mental drugs that will buy him more time. And still, for Ted, in some small, meaningful ways, the fight is more than ever about being normal. For example, at dinner last week, Ted ordered a beer. He can’t drink it. He took a sip. “It’s fun to order one, though,” he said. ‘I WANT MORE THAN ANYTHING TO GET BACK TO LIFE. I WANT A SENSE OF NORMALCY.’ Ted Winn | Nike executive and Astoria High School graduate who is battling brain cancer “Even in that awful moment Ted was more worried about how the news would affect me and he wanted to soften the blow.” Ted was in great shape before his diagnosis. He was working out regularly at Nike. He leaned on the personal train- ers, such as former NFL defen- sive back Alex Molden, who are made available to work with employees. Ted ran faster, lifted more, and felt great. All this, doctors said, helped with the initial battle with cancer. Along with chemotherapy and medication, he attacked his condition with verve. The cancer went away. Ted won. He went back to work. For 2 1/2 years, his brain scans were clear. This was a medical victory. Everyone celebrated it. Still, his wife, Sandi said, “Even when Ted was in remis- sion I never felt like I could live without the worry.” No one fights cancer alone. Even if they say so. It’s appar- ent in the way Sandi clutches her husband’s hand, or how she journals his progress, up late, writing thousands of words about a nightmare she wishes ‘Stay strong, Ted’ The first inspirational video message arrived by text and came from Los Angeles Rams punter Johnny Hekker. Ted knew him through a friend. Hekker, a former Oregon State player, looked into the camera and said among other things, “Stay strong Ted, we all love you.” “That just lifted me up,” Ted said. Then came another mes- sage, this one from Ryan Allen, who punts for the New England Patriots. Allen was born in Salem, and had once roomed with Hekker in Cor- vallis at Oregon State before he transferred to Louisiana Tech. He heard about Ted’s fight and so Allen sat recording a video and said, “The mind and body is a powerful thing. If you can beat it once, you can beat it again.” Some colleagues at Nike have reached out to Ted with notes and encouragement. He loves to hear from them. Sometimes people don’t know what to say. He forgives those who don’t. And both Ted and Sandi said it’s uplifting when people let them know they’re thinking about them. In fact, Sandi gets a short written note of encouragement every week from a woman who had a fight with cancer herself. Said Sandi: “She said somebody did that for her, and it helped her a ton to get through it.” Those videos on Ted’s phone are his on-call encour- agement. Technology has done that. People say all the time, “We’d be lost without our phones.” That’s Ted. Not because he wants to make a call. But because when he’s down, he pulls out the phone and watches those videos. Oregon State men’s bas- ketball coach Wayne Tinkle recorded a video message and sent it to Ted, telling him to keep fighting. Then, quarter- back Derek Anderson of the Carolina Panthers sent one. So did former Rams running back Marshall Faulk. Then, Ore- gon Ducks point guard Pay- ton Pritchard gave a heartfelt video speech for Ted. So did the entire Oregon State foot- ball team. The Beavers, in the locker room, cut a video mes- sage of encouragement. There have been well wishes from the Trail Blazers, and from Holly- wood, and from politicians. Why do they do it? “I feel like if I can lift some- one’s spirit, even in the small- est way, why not?” Anderson, a former Oregon State quarter- back, said. “It takes just a little bit of your time.” Pritchard, point guard of the Ducks basketball team, said, “It’s more about just knowing that you’re there and that you’re praying for him and him knowing that every- one supports him.” Go. Fight. Winn. That’s the rally cry now. It cuts across the Civil War rivalry. It spans across the country. Ted received a mes- sage from director and pro- ducer Steven Spielberg, who was overseas and told him he was thinking of him and to keep battling. Another came from former Vice President Al Gore, who quoted from the film “Chariots of Fire.” Said Gore in his video mes- sage: “In Chariots of Fire, one of the characters says, ‘When I run I feel God’s pleasure.’ … feel God’s pleasure, Ted.” Not this weekend Ted Winn knows his story will be about different things to different people. Some will relate to being a father, fight- ing and faced with leaving a family behind. Others will cast themselves as the signifi- cant other, smothered by an ill- ness she can’t touch or see but wants so badly to punch in the face. Others will see the strong Winn children, or the support- ive co-workers, or the celeb- rities, politicians and athletes who took a small moment to try to help lift a big soul. “It’s that horrible dream that doesn’t seem to end,” Sandi said. Ted squeezes her hand and drinks his coffee. There’s talk about the children. Also, about his disability pay. A family friend created a fund to help the family bridge medical bills and expenses. We all accept that there are no guarantees in life. But after you have holes drilled into your skull, you never see it quite the same. Brain cancer, remission, then cancer twice again. As much as the Winn family would love to organize the events of the last three years into some- thing orderly, and chronologi- cal, their life in the last three years feels like a pile of ran- dom strands of yarn, unraveled on the table. Then, Sandi speaks. “Every day is a gift,” she said, “I realize now we should all be living that way.” Ted is a father. A husband. A friend. He’s sick, too. But what he isn’t? Alone. The Winn family finds joy in the little things. Breakfast. Hold- ing hands over coffee. Those simple video messages. And they look for hope in the big- ger things. Ted’s responding well to the experimental medicine. Doctors put a port in his body on Thursday with the hopes that he’ll have sustained suc- cess. He looks energetic and sounds optimistic. Instead of preparing for the end of life, this family is treating it like something else. A beginning. Ted was told he might not last the weekend, remember? Said Ted: “Ya know, it just doesn’t feel to me like it’s going to be THIS weekend.”
