Janet Hulme and Erika McMillin

[00:02] JANET HULME: I'm Janet Hume, and I'm 75 years old. Today is Saturday, June 18, 2022, in Missoula, Montana. I'm being interviewed by my daughter, Erica McMillin

[00:20] ERICA MCMILLIN: And I am Erica McMillin and I am 48 years old. It's Saturday, June 18, 2022. We're in Missoula, Montana. I'm interviewing Janet Hulme who's my mom. So to get started, I guess, fun to be here, we wanted to just visit a little bit about you and your life and maybe the adventures we've had. So tell me a little bit about where you were born when you were a little girl.

[00:54] JANET HULME: Well, I was born in Seattle, but the only reason I was born in Seattle was that my mother's family thought that Montana was cowboys and Indians, so they went back, and I was born in Seattle, which is where she was raised. But I've lived in Montana most all of my life. And as a young child, I lived in billings for about four years and in Great Falls for a short time and then in Bozeman most of my life from the time I was eight. And I benefited from a little cow town, Bozeman, Montana, which only had about 10,000 people then, and 3000 of those were students. And it was the ag college. So when I say it was a redneck cow town, it really was. There was some other emphases at the university, but my dad was an ag econ professor, an extension consultant, so, and my mother was a teacher. So my memories of living in Bozeman is that people were kind and they were accepting of who I was as long as I fit society's norms, which were that as a little girl and growing up into high school, that I would excel in academics and that I would also know how to cook and clean and sew and embroider and all of those things. And I then, as a young woman, I would go to college, get married and have kids. And college in that day for women, for the most part, was to prepare you in case you had to support yourself. But that wasn't my idea of fun. My idea and my dream from the time I was eleven was that I wanted to be a physical therapist. And why did I come up with that? I don't know exactly. There was only one physical therapist in the whole state of Montana, and he was a man located in Bozeman. So I had met him. I knew I didn't want to be a nurse because a woman who had come from Iran and was living with us and going to school was working as a nurse's aide at the hospital. And she told me about all the things she had to clean up when people were sick. And I thought, I can't be a nurse, I don't want to do that. And I wanted to be physically active and I wanted to be intellectually stimulated. And so I decided I was going to be a physical therapist at eleven. At eleven. And stuck my whole life.

[04:00] ERICA MCMILLIN: Yeah.

[04:01] JANET HULME: So when I went to school, went to college, high school, I just went to high school. It wasn't particularly exciting for me. I wasn't the best at anything I tell my kids and I say to other people, I never succeeded totally at anything except baking bread. And I did become the champion bread maker one year in four h. And I thought, oh, okay, I'll just make bread the rest of my life and be a champion. Well, the next year I made bread and I even added something to it, like maybe cranberries or something, and they didn't give me the championship. So I realized very soon that what you succeed at 1 minute, you may be a failure, quote, in that you're not first the next minute. And so you better have a lot of things going on so that you have a potential to succeed at one of them. And that success isn't winning. Success is trying and experiencing things and enjoying them at whatever level you do. So I had to realize that very soon because I wasn't the best at anything particularly.

[05:21] ERICA MCMILLIN: So you said you wanted to be a PT or a physical therapist. So how did you get there? Like, what does that, what does that entail?

[05:28] JANET HULME: Well, my father and mother were very, I was an only child and my father and mother were very supportive. And so they explored how I would be a physical therapist. And they found out that in Missoula, at the University of Montana, there was a pre physical therapy program. So I attended college at MSU in Bozeman for two years. But then they helped arrange and I was willing to come to Missoula and go to school the last two years knowing that I wouldn't be a physical therapist, but they could help me get into physical therapy school. So my father drove me over here one day and had made arrangements with the head of the pre physical therapy program, Mister Wilson. And I was to meet with him. And we got over here and we find out he's in the hospital and he's had gallbladder surgery. But the nice man said, well, come up to my hospital room and I'll talk to you. So my dad and I went up to St. Patrick's Hospital and we talked to him and he said, we want you to come. So I came over here and.

[06:39] ERICA MCMILLIN: And what year was this? When?

[06:40] JANET HULME: This time I graduated from high school in 1964. This would have been 1966. And before that, I want to say the summer before I came over here, the war in Vietnam was still covert. It wasn't anything many people knew about, but the military army knew that they needed physical therapists, so they were offering free experience that they would pay if you would come down to Fitzsimmons Hospital in Denver and work for a summer, well, part of a summer. And they were hoping then that they could sign you up for officer training school as a physical therapist. So I went down there the summer before I came over to Missoula, and I worked there, and I got to see this little girl from Bozeman, Montana, who'd been very protected, got to see the first of these young men coming back from being injured. And I will never forget the six foot six guy now paralyzed from the shoulders down. And we were teaching him how to walk young, probably 22, 24 years old. Another one burned from his neck down, and we were pulling off dead skin in a big whirlpool from him, and he was screaming with pain. And then a lot of other ones that were minor compared to those two. But I decided I still wanted to be a physical therapist, but I didn't want to be in the military, even if they would pay everything for me, because I am too independent. I don't follow protocols as much as you need to follow. So that was informational to me. Then I came over to Missoula, and I was a fish out of water in Missoula. The Vietnam war and the protests and everything were getting started, and people were dressing very casually in jeans and t shirts and in Bozeman, I had been in a sorority, and we wore suits and nylons and girdles and high heels to class, and we went six days a week. And then you went to fraternities and partied, and over here, there was some of that. But the people I got to know from Butte didn't do that. They partied at their butte, at their apartments or wherever. And then the dress was very casual and the thinking was very radical. So I became aware, coming from this redneck cow town of Butte culture, because I fell in love with a boy from Butte who'd been an underground miner and was now going to school. Very bright. I always thought bright could solve anything. And I learned Butte culture, which is knowing how to play, knowing how to drink, knowing how to have a good time and studying. But one day I came to his apartment and his friends had just come up from California. And they had what they told me was a roach clip hanging from their neck. And they were talking about drugs and other things that I knew nothing about. And I drank very little. I couldn't drink. I didn't like it. And these guys were just. They were the first ones that brought drugs to Montana from Butte. And so they let me hang out with them because I was going with one of their good friends. But they became very involved in using drugs and then distributing drugs in this early phase between 66 and 68. And so much as I was in love with this butte guy, they jettisoned me before I graduated. And I was just devastated. I would have given up my whole physical therapy career for this guy, which would have been the biggest mistake I could make. But that was my experience here. I got straight as. I loved the classes. And so I had two lives. I had the academic life, but then I had this life of being with these people from Butte. And I wouldn't give up either one, to be honest with you, because I learned so much about these divergent cultures. And then it was time to apply to physical therapy school. And they lived up to their word, Mister Wilson. And Nora Steele, which was another professor who was a big mentor of mine, she wanted me to go to medical school. And I said no. I really didn't think I wanted to do that. There weren't that many women physicians. And I thought I wanted to be married and have kids. And I couldn't wrap that around in my head and be a physician. So I said no. They said, well, we'll help you get into PT school. Apply here, here and here. And one of them was Stanford. And Stanford had gotten a lot of money, again from the federal government to have a master's program. The physical therapy programs were certificates or bachelor's programs, no masters. This was brand new. And they said, well, apply and see if you get in. So I applied there and I applied at San Francisco, which was a certificate program, and it would be twelve months. And Stanford was two years. And of course I'm still in love with this guy, even though he's jettisoned me. So I want to just get through with PT school fast. And I get accepted at all of them that I applied to. And I said to my dad, well, I think I'll go to San Francisco. It only takes twelve months. My father never told me what to do. He was a quiet man. But this time he said, jandenne, you were accepted at Stanford. And you're going to go, wow. I didn't like him, so I went to Stanford. And it was the best thing that could have ever happened to me, because all of a sudden I'm with people intellectually that want to learn and that are excited about innovation. And at that time, there were no grades. If you didn't want them, you just learned. You learned at a rate that you wanted to learn at. And the libraries there at the medical school were just huge. I'd walk into them and feel like I was at home. So it was a wonderful experience. I've carried it with me the rest of my life. And I met your dad there.

[13:57] ERICA MCMILLIN: That's right.

[13:58] JANET HULME: Have I talked enough now?

[14:01] ERICA MCMILLIN: So you met dad there? He met my dad.

[14:04] JANET HULME: Right.

[14:05] ERICA MCMILLIN: How did you guys meet?

[14:07] JANET HULME: Well, he lived in the same high rise apartment building that Stanford had built on campus. And he liked my roommate. As you know, he was not a real social person, but he had records and he thought maybe he could wheedle his way into her records life by exchanging records. So he came up to the apartment one day and said, you know, I've got these jazz records. Would you like to listen to him? And she said, no, and walked out. So I met him then, but very briefly. But about a week later, I was out driving my car, looking at the dirt roads around Stanford. I'm sure there's no dirt roads now. And I got my car stuck in the mud.

[14:56] ERICA MCMILLIN: Oh, gosh, I never heard this before.

[14:58] JANET HULME: And so I had to walk back and I thought, what am I going to do? I hardly know anybody here. And so I knew where he lived. It was on the first floor. And I thought, okay, I'm just going to knock on his door and see if he'll help me. So I knocked on his door, and your father came to the door in his underwear. And I looked in his eyes and he had the most beautiful blue eyes. They were uniquely blue. Sort of a. I don't know what to say.

[15:32] ERICA MCMILLIN: They're my eyes.

[15:34] JANET HULME: Yeah, they're very different blue. Gorgeous. I looked in those eyes and in my mind came the really strong thought. You're going to have this guy's kids, not you're in love with them. I mean, I was attracted to him, but no, you're going to have this guy's kids. And that's the way my mind works. It tells me what I'm going to do. Anyway, I just said, stock, will you come help me? He did. And then we started going out for meals, and he loves spaghetti and meatballs, so we'd go out to the cheapest place and eat spaghetti and meatballs. Now, the interesting thing was he was on a full ride, working scholarship at Stanford, MBA, masters of business, and he was working for Hewlett Packard part time, and they were funding him. And after we'd been going out to dinner for, let's say, six weeks or two months into the quarter, he announced he'd run out of money. And I said, you've run out of money? Well, yeah. I said, well, why were we going out to eat? Well, we had money then, and that was sort of the tale of our lives, if I had realized that. But I didn't. I come from a father who's german, Swiss, who plans everything. And if you plan what you're going to spend each week or each month, and if you run out, you eat beans, tell you the next week comes along. That wasn't it. But we had a lot of good times because I'd come up with all these ideas I wanted to do, and he'd go, sure, let's go do it. He was just my kind of person because he was interested in going up to the seashore. He was interested in going rock climbing, whatever we wanted to do. And he learned how to cross country ski. We went up to Yosemite. He'd never skied before in his life. I'd skied, of course, in Bozeman, and he learned how to cross country ski, and we had a great time.

[17:47] ERICA MCMILLIN: So what happened after college or after graduate school?

[17:51] JANET HULME: Well, this was graduate school, so I got my masters, and he did, too. And the interesting thing was my parents, of course, are down there at graduation and his parents are not. And by that time, we were engaged and planning the wedding. We were going to get married shortly after we graduated, the end of June, and up in Montana, up in Bozeman, and his parents announced that they weren't coming. And nobody else was coming. Well, I'd never met them. I didn't know who they were. So we had the wedding, and indeed, none of his family came, except a brother showed up at the last minute, Jack. And Jack brought his cousin. So there was some family. And Jack just said, I decided we were coming. So we drove across the country from Pennsylvania here, and that's the way it is.

[18:47] ERICA MCMILLIN: And where did you guys get married?

[18:49] JANET HULME: We got married at Lone Mountain chapel up the Gallatin canyon. It was pouring down rain. My mother was bound and determined. She was very religious woman that we were going to have an organ and we were going to have traditional music. And I was bound and determined. I was going to have a guitar and have folk music. She wanted me to have a traditional wedding dress, and I was going to wear a. It was white or off white pants that I sewed myself. And a top. So her sister, who was a beautiful seamstress, showed up from Seattle, and she was very kind, and she said, jan, would you let me sew a top for you that you might like? If you don't like it, you don't have to wear it. Well, it's gorgeous. So she sewed a top. But I did wear my pants for the wedding. They were wide pants. People nowadays would wear them. But my mother had to swallow a lot, and she did, and she was very proud of me. But I always was doing things little out of the ordinary for her. She would have preferred that I stay in a lane a little bit more. A little more. Not a lot, but a little more.

[20:12] ERICA MCMILLIN: And so what happened with the music?

[20:14] JANET HULME: Well. Oh, yes, the music. So here's the night of the wedding, and don't you know, there's a thunderstorm and it's pouring down rain, thunder and lightning. We're up the Gallatin canyon, and there's no electricity. Well, an organ doesn't work. We didn't have a pump organ. So we had. We were going to have both. That was going to be the compromise. So of course, we had the guitar and folk music, and she was very happy that we had that.

[20:42] ERICA MCMILLIN: No music at all.

[20:44] JANET HULME: And his friends, there were three of his friends from Stanford who flew their little private plane in and came to the wedding, which was really nice. So the wedding was nice, and we had the reception. And this is where I think we began to understand. We had the reception in the basement of the church in Bozeman, in the presbyterian church.

[21:08] ERICA MCMILLIN: So you went back into Bozeman?

[21:10] JANET HULME: We went back into Bozeman. And of course, my parents were teetotalers. And I think Dick had to have told his parents that there would be no alcohol. Well, when I get back to Pittsburgh. And we took a trip across Canada and then landed in Pittsburgh, and I walked into this house in a nice suburb. And all the other houses had neat lawns, and houses were well taken care of. They were only maybe ten years old. And their house, the lawn was not taken care of. It was practically dead. And the windows, you know, weren't taken care of. And I could tell, oh, this isn't my dad's swiss house with geraniums in the windows. And we walk in, and his mother's very friendly and. But I could tell this is a bare bones house. And the first thing she said to me was, oh, I hear you're a champion bread maker. I want. You can make bread for us tonight. Well, this is to a young lady who's just graduated from Stanford and thinks she's the cat's meow of physical therapy. The bread was far in the past, so I said, well, I'd be glad to make it. And then she went to the refrigerator and she took out a big glass, clear liquid, and she was drinking it. And she said, I didn't ask her, but I assumed it was water. We stayed there about ten days. His father wasn't there. His father was a salesman. He sold pharmacy hardware to redesign pharmacies from the old days to the new days with all the fancy hardware and things. So he came home that weekend, really nice man, personable, could talk to anybody. Now, Dick, your dad, you know, was very shy or wordless sometimes and intellectual. So I took a look at that. I'm 24 years old. I don't know anything. But I took a look at that, and then I noticed that she's not drinking water. She's drinking vodka, and she's keeping that vodka in the refrigerator. And then the dad is drinking beer. Very friendly, nice. But, you know, that's just their lifestyle. They've never changed their lifestyle since high school. They met in high school and married right out of high school during World War Two. And so I didn't fit in number one very well. But I tried. However, after a week, I said to.

[24:11] ERICA MCMILLIN: Dick, I was going to say, what's next?

[24:16] JANET HULME: I said to Dick, this is not your father. You are the milkman's son or a bastard of some kind, because there's no way I told you that.

[24:33] ERICA MCMILLIN: Yes, I told you that.

[24:36] JANET HULME: And he says, oh, no, we were laughing about it, and don't you know? So we leave there and come back to California and we're going to get jobs. But don't, you know what? 30 years, 40 years later, probably 30 years later, 30 years later, we find out that, no, that isn't his father, that his mother knew all along who the father was, but she was more in love with rich than she was with the father. The father wanted to marry her, and she refused and then persuaded rich when he got off the boat on leave that they should get married immediately. And her story, and she could tell stories like, you can't believe that they got pregnant the first night right after they were married. And nine months later, I think it.

[25:35] ERICA MCMILLIN: Was more like seven, nine months.

[25:37] JANET HULME: Well, she lied about when they got married. Nine months later, they had this baby. So she had a whole story about her life made up that was based on what she wanted, and everybody went along with it and I think, truly believed it.

[25:55] ERICA MCMILLIN: Yeah. Anyway, so then what did you guys do after your trip back, your honeymoon? Like, where did you work? Where did you decide to live?

[26:03] JANET HULME: So we went back to California, and we didn't have a nickel to our name, and I started applying, and I got a job at Kaiser Permanente with a wonderful physical therapist who really had a national reputation in manual therapy. He'd just come back from Australia, and manual therapy was new.

[26:26] ERICA MCMILLIN: So where was Kaiser Permanente?

[26:28] JANET HULME: And Kaiser Permanente where I worked was on the East Bay.

[26:31] ERICA MCMILLIN: Oh, back down in California?

[26:32] JANET HULME: Yeah, yeah, across from San Francisco. And your dad was. Could have was offered a job at Hewlett Packard, but he said no, he wanted to work for nonprofits.

[26:45] ERICA MCMILLIN: I don't think I knew that. I'm not surprised.

[26:49] JANET HULME: Yes, he wanted to work for nonprofits. I'm thinking Hewlett Packard put you through school. Hewlett Packard is offering you a sub management position. No, I want to work for nonprofits. And it's during a recession, and nonprofits don't have any money. And so he ended up working maybe a couple of weeks here, a couple weeks there. This is with a brand new MBA from Stanford. So about six months into this, I said, look, dick, you've got to go find a job somewhere out of state. This isn't working. This isn't working. I've got a job, but I am nothing willing, and I'm not tolerating well that you aren't working. So just go find one and I'll come. I have to work here for a year, but then I'll come wherever you are. That's the last time I ever said that. But I did. So where does he head? He headed up to Montana to my dad and mom and stayed with them for, I don't know, a little bit, and found a job in Anaconda, Montana, in development, economic development. Well, that fit him. But again, it was a federally subsidized development job that paid very little. It paid dollar 500 a month. I remember dollar 500 a month. And they were developing the hot springs.

[28:32] ERICA MCMILLIN: Over there, what's now Fairmont.

[28:34] JANET HULME: Yes. It was junkie they helped develop that got the funding for it. So they were doing a really purposeful job. And your dad was really good at helping with that. The. But is he got us a place to live. And when I arrived after staying at my job a year. He said, well, here's where we're staying. And we drove out to just a little ways out of town to a cow pasture. And there was a chicken coop that had been converted into a little house and the cows were still in the pasture and that's where we were living. And the cows would come and put their noses on our windows and look in our windows.

[29:20] ERICA MCMILLIN: Oh, my goodness.

[29:21] JANET HULME: And we had so little money because there were no jobs for me up here that right away, anyway, and that we could not go out anywhere for a beer, for a night out at all. Once a month we could go to this bar and get a french dip sandwich and split it. And of course, I'm running the show now financially, because I know that he would just spend it all and then we'd have nothing. So I'm saying, well, once a month we could do this. So that's the laugh about that. When it snowed that winter, it covered the whole. It covered the whole little house. And we had to dig out like an igloo.

[30:19] ERICA MCMILLIN: So what happened after anaconda? Where did you get a job?

[30:23] JANET HULME: Well, I got a job up at Boulder River School and hospital for the developmentally disabled. And because that was the only job three days a week. So I traveled from anaconda up to Boulder over the path in my little green, whatever it was. I can't remember this little car in the middle of the winter. And these semis would go by. I couldn't see anybody. I didn't care. I just drove up there and worked. And I thought, I'm going to make this the best job that ever was.

[30:57] ERICA MCMILLIN: And how long did you work there?

[30:59] JANET HULME: I worked there about four years. I became the head of the department. I developed all new programs for these people. They were lying in their pee and being fed liquid meals. There were 850 people there. The people in the hospital were just laying down. They were fed these liquid meals and I got them sitting up and eating whole foods and we got them walking and doing activities. I mean, it was exciting. And then I wrote my first research papers on this. So when I left, then I started having kids, you and Abby and. But I had a reputation of doing something innovative. And I spent the rest of my life doing that.

[31:49] ERICA MCMILLIN: Yes.

[31:51] JANET HULME: So we're coming to the end. But the rest of my life was spent then always doing innovative things. I didn't sit back and I knew I couldn't sit back and have your dad do the innovative things. And I support because he just. That wasn't him, but he was willing.

[32:13] ERICA MCMILLIN: To go along with mine, pitched in. He was a good pitcher in her.

[32:17] JANET HULME: Right. So when they called and said, do you want to come and help start the physical therapy program in Missoula? I said, sure. And we moved over here, and I helped start the physical therapy program, and I was the director, and I taught for ten years here. And then I'm going to go really fast now.

[32:40] ERICA MCMILLIN: Take your time.

[32:41] JANET HULME: Then I decided I'd had enough of that, even though I was tenured. And I said, I'm leaving. I'm going to start a private practice in biofeedback and incontinence. And they all looked at me like I was nuts because I had two little kids, and your dad had gone off to get a PhD in Washington. And I said, well, it's just what I want to do. And so I did, and that became very successful. And then I started the bagel bakery, and that became very successful. And I got you guys a hot dog cart.

[33:19] ERICA MCMILLIN: I remember the hot dog cart.

[33:21] JANET HULME: What do you remember about the hot dog cart?

[33:23] ERICA MCMILLIN: I did not want to work at the hot dog cart.

[33:25] JANET HULME: I thought you did.

[33:26] ERICA MCMILLIN: No, no, I did not want to work any at the. I worked at a nursing home for a few, you know, months the one summer. But no, I, you know, I was 14 years old. I didn't. 15 years old. I didn't want to work at a hot dog cart. I ended up really liking it. But when you came home and told us that that was what we were doing, it was not what I thought. I was curious, but, yeah, we had great. I mean, I just have great memories.

[33:52] JANET HULME: Of the hot dog.

[33:53] ERICA MCMILLIN: The hot dog cart.

[33:54] JANET HULME: You were the first hot dog cart in Missoula, Montana.

[33:56] ERICA MCMILLIN: Yes. Well, we bought it. Who did we buy it from? Somebody had it before.

[33:59] JANET HULME: Well, yeah, somebody had it. It was two attorneys that had been going to law school, and they wanted to get rid of it. They had it for a short time, and so I bought it. I didn't know anything about even how to start a grill with propane, let alone how to pull a trailer with a hot dog cart on it, but I didn't care. I thought, well, I can learn this. It's not rocket science. Maybe I can learn rocket science, too.

[34:24] ERICA MCMILLIN: I learned a lot about. So she budgeting and selling and interacting with people and being with no cellphones nowadays. Kids wouldn't understand, but. Nope. You'd drop me off on the corner. Dad usually would. At 11:00 1030 11:00 and I'd sell hot dogs on the street corner. In Helena. In Missoula. We're not in Helena. In Missoula for 3 hours. And then he'd come back and pick me up. And there was no way to go to the bathroom or ask for help or. I remember one day I cut my ankle. I still have a scar. Cut my ankle so much and bled all over. And there was nothing you could do. I just wrapped it in napkins and kept going. So. Yeah, but it was a wonderful learning opportunity. I wouldn't trade it for the word.

[35:10] JANET HULME: I was getting a business degree.

[35:12] ERICA MCMILLIN: That's right.

[35:13] JANET HULME: Practical. And I didn't want them working for anybody else because I was concerned that they wouldn't treat them right.

[35:20] ERICA MCMILLIN: Yeah. My first summer at the nursing home wasn't super great.

[35:22] JANET HULME: No, no.

[35:25] ERICA MCMILLIN: But it enabled us to do lots of different things.

[35:29] JANET HULME: I think. I never know how you all perceived it. Tell me how you perceived all these different changes that I did and new things I did.

[35:38] ERICA MCMILLIN: It was just our life. I didn't know any different. I didn't know. I mean, at that time, I didn't even know that we were struggling or that, you know, hard times. I mean, we were involved in four h and sewing and, you know, violin and swimming. Swimming? Yes, swimming. Swimming was a pretty dominant force in our life for most of our. Most of our growing up. But, you know, that was just our life. I did not like violin. That was hard for me. I did. I mean, I did it and I enjoyed little bits of it, but it was a lot of work clear through high school.

[36:12] JANET HULME: You enjoyed?

[36:12] ERICA MCMILLIN: I did. I didn't typically say no to you. I'm getting better at it now. At almost 50 years old.

[36:22] JANET HULME: I think she. I think I intimidated them.

[36:26] ERICA MCMILLIN: But. No, I wouldn't say intimidated. I just. Well, yeah, okay. But I love. I mean, I learned so much about helping and when, after college, when I wasn't sure what I wanted to do and came back here and helped you run the.

[36:37] JANET HULME: Well, see, the publishing business. A publishing business. And I started writing books and lecturing all over the US and even overseas, some on this muscle system. I figured out that nobody'd figure it out.

[36:51] ERICA MCMILLIN: Ran the business and traveled some with you and learned a lot about that. I remember taking you. You'd had surgery on your finger.

[37:00] JANET HULME: Oh, do you remember that?

[37:01] ERICA MCMILLIN: Yeah, I. Or your flex and Tendon. And so we. About three days after surgery, you needed to be in another state to lecture and so loaded you on the plane and you were not doing very well. Luckily, by the time we got there, you knew it well. Enough. You just did your little spiel, and then I load you in back into the hotel room.

[37:21] JANET HULME: That's why this time is going so fast. I used to lecture three days straight, 8 hours a day.

[37:26] ERICA MCMILLIN: Yes.

[37:27] JANET HULME: Every other weekend for 15 years.

[37:30] ERICA MCMILLIN: Was it that long? Yes. So, yeah, I mean, that was a really informative, fun time for me. I think it gave me confidence, you know, I wasn't doing the lecturing to be as comfortable speaking in public and, you know, leading as much as I do. I still help out a lot. I'm more of a helper than a leader.

[37:50] JANET HULME: But you are speaking out, though.

[37:52] ERICA MCMILLIN: I am. Yes.

[37:53] JANET HULME: You are speaking out.

[37:55] ERICA MCMILLIN: Yep. I pretty.

[37:58] JANET HULME: I'm proud of both of them. Both of them are in positions of speaking out for good.

[38:05] ERICA MCMILLIN: Yes.

[38:06] JANET HULME: Don't you think?

[38:07] ERICA MCMILLIN: I agree.

[38:07] JANET HULME: Right.

[38:08] ERICA MCMILLIN: Speak up for kids and speak up for teachers.

[38:11] JANET HULME: Right.

[38:13] ERICA MCMILLIN: Yeah. We've had a good life.

[38:15] JANET HULME: I think we've had a good life. But I will say it was a very structured life because their dad was gone getting a PhD, and I wouldn't follow him. I followed him once, and I realized that I wanted them to have a stable life, and that was going to be in Missoula, Montana, and Missoula, montana, was a wonderful place for them to grow up. Do you think so?

[38:41] ERICA MCMILLIN: I 100% agree, and I really value that. We're all in Helena now together.

[38:45] JANET HULME: Now we're all in Helena. So what's the last question you want.

[38:51] ERICA MCMILLIN: To ask me that, you know, I don't think I have any other questions. I think you've done a great job. Do you have one more thing you want to talk about?

[39:00] JANET HULME: Well, I always say if someone puts a no or a roadblock or a doubt in your mind, it's my responsibility for myself or your responsibility for yourself to figure out a way to get around that. So if you're dreaming something, which I would. I'd come up with these dreams. I didn't make them up. They just came up. It was my job to figure out how to make that happen with a lot of help from other people, but not to let other people's negativity stop me.

[39:39] ERICA MCMILLIN: Mm hmm.

[39:41] JANET HULME: And I.

[39:42] ERICA MCMILLIN: Where did that come from? Sure didn't come from your parents, maybe your mom.

[39:46] JANET HULME: It came from learning that you could either sit and end up doing nothing because people put limits on you, because they don't want you to do more than they're doing or fly as high as you can fly.

[40:02] ERICA MCMILLIN: Yeah. We didn't even get to talk about your flying.

[40:04] JANET HULME: Yes, I did. I got my pilot's license because I was flying all over the state helping develop these programs when they deinstitutionalize boulder. So he said, if you don't want to throw up, fly.

[40:18] ERICA MCMILLIN: I remember that. I don't remember. I remember hearing about it.

[40:20] JANET HULME: So I wish we could talk more, but thank you for inviting me here.

[40:30] ERICA MCMILLIN: It.