A year ago my best friend died. Not a day goes by I don’t think of David Larsen. No man, save my father and my two sons has had more impact on my life. No man, save my father and my two sons have I loved as I have David. On the anniversary of his death I am feeling reflective. I miss him.

He came into my life when I was forty-four. He was my boss. At the time I was in my early years of broadcasting at a radio station in Kelowna BC and David had been hired as the Program Director. He was younger than I and had already accumulated an impressive resume. I wasn’t to know for some time but David from the earliest moments had told the station owner that ‘Tony Peyton’ had to go. Two things come to mind.

First, David was absolutely correct, I was terrible. In fact, I was so bad on-air that listeners took the time to write in block letters,

‘PEYTON MUST GO! HE IS THE WORST BROADCASTER ON KELOWNA RADIO’

Well, lucky guess Mr. Radio Critic! But none of that would have surprised David. He had already come to the same conclusion. What I didn’t know was that the owner had asked David to give me three months and if by that time he still wanted to fire me, he would support that decision.

Three months. Are you kidding me. Give me three months and I can turn the Titanic. An acquired taste, that I am but with three months I can serve up many Tasty Tony Offerings and turn the most ardent critics.

Second, I had one other advantage. I was absolutely clueless. I had no idea that David intended to fire me and thank goodness for that. I just went on my merry way every single day being a really, really bad broadcaster, blissfully unaware that the Sword of Damacles was suspended above my head.

David was as advertised. He was a very good broadcaster and a brilliant Program Director. It is not an easy job. Hard decisions are made and most of them affect real people and their families and David at first blush, was not the sort of man one would expect in that role. He was gentle and kind and unassuming, enjoying more the limelight shining on those around him than on himself.

I wasn’t to know at the time but as I have reflected on the Tony ’44’ version, I was a bit of Wounded Duck at that point in my life; one of those Deceptive Ducks, just fine by all appearances on the surface but in reality a Duck who had lost his flight feathers, paddling frantically in circles. Wow! Just read that. My apologies, I’ll get off the Ducks Unlimited metaphor immediately. And why all the capitals all of a sudden? Gheeesh!

Today as I write, Tony ’72’ is by no small measure a reflection of lessons learned from my best friend David. No one reduces to just a few words but if I had just a few words some come easily to mind: Kind. Good. Fair. Honest. Funny. Assertive. Insistent. Brave. Generous. Measured. Uncomplicated. One story has stuck with me. It reminds me always how decent David was.

At a station meeting not too long after David had arrived I spoke harshly to one of the staff. After the meeting David asked me come to his office.

“Why did you speak to her that way?”

“She was wrong David, you know she was.”

“That’s not what I asked Tony. I asked why did you speak to her that way?”

He hadn’t raised his voice and he displayed little emotion but I was nonplussed to say the least. He was right of course. And that was David. That, I think was the first time I recognized I was with someone special, a good and decent man who had the conviction to ask me why I spoke disrespectfully. That he didn’t do it in anger or level it as an accusation was disarming. I can remember telling my wife Mac that evening, “I think I’ve met my match. He’s a good fellow though.”

From there, I was all in. I had the good sense to recognize a good man when I saw him and the good sense to let him influence me. Between David and Mac, I was blessed to have them as my friends.

And as for those three months? We did have a talk after ninety days but it wasn’t to fire me. It was to tell me about my future. And as was his style, it was delivered in a straightforward matter of fact way.

“‘You have no future as a news director, you’re an entertainer.’

And with that he saved my radio career.

There is so much he taught me in the years we had together. Patience and respect for starters. He helped me to understand how to listen, really listen, rather than just wait for the space to open up before I spoke again. And I suspect he influenced others in the same way in his quiet, understated David style. He never sought the limelight or even recognition. Goodness knows he wasn’t self promoting, which I always thought was partly why he didn’t get the professional recognition he so deserved; other louder, more self promoting broadcasters being advanced ahead of David must have been so frustrating. A few years after David put together the ‘David, Kelly and Tony’ Morning Show on what was then SILK FM in Kelowna, we were recognized with the British Columbia Association of Broadcasters ‘Performers of the Year’ award. We had climbed a high mountain indeed but I have always known that it was David’s award, his accomplishment. Kelly Abbott was very talented and contributed mightily to the show and was a big part of our success but it was David’s vision and day in day out insistence that made the show so good. My contribution was more modest. I was a willing contributor and did what I had to do to get better. In a hurry.

And what fun we had. There wasn’t anywhere we wouldn’t do our show. At 6500′ above sea level on Gem Lake at Big White in BC’s Okanagan. It was midwinter, and overnight our ‘set up’ for the show had been destroyed in a howling winter storm so that when we arrived back up at the summit of Gem Lake around 4:30am the next day it was destroyed. We had a mic and a Ford F150. And that is where we did our show from. David never missed a beat. He was always as cool as a cucumber, unflappable under pressure.

We did another mid-winter outdoor show atop a new sixteen story building in Kelowna. My job was to do cut-ins from various locations. The ‘location’ I chose for one of most memorable was at the end of a sixteen story crane arm. I had shimied out on my stomach, no gloves, no safety netting, no safety harness in -10C and neither Kelly nor David knew I was out there.

“Let’s go to Tony. Hey Tone Dog, where are you? What have you got?”

“I’m over here David. End of the crane.”

Both of them were mortified. And I was in danger.

“Okay, well we’re going to make this one short everybody. Tony has got himself in a dangerous place and we need to go help him out.”

It remains the most dangerous thing I have ever done but it was I have to say, great radio. Whoever was listening was sure to stay tuned just to see if I made it, if for no other reason. But that was David’s influence. I shouldn’t have done that, of that there is little doubt. It was dangerous and I was scared. More fool me. But David taught us about radio, a medium he loved and understood so well. At its best it’s spontaneous, its emotive and human, it’s storytelling and done well, it is compelling for listeners. At our best, we were all of that and that was David’s doing.

And he took our show to Mexico. ‘David, Kelly and Tony’ took a plane load of listeners to Puerto Vallarta, Huatulco and Manzanillo. Well, he didn’t actually take the listeners but without David our radio show would not have gone much further afield than Vernon BC. So there I was, part of a #1 rated morning show on the beach in Puerto Vallarta, broadcasting back to Kelowna. Three years earlier I was “THE WORST BROADCASTER EVER ON KELOWNA RADIO“.

Nobody was more surprised than I was.

And there was more reward than the BCAB award. Near the turn of the century our show, ‘David, Kelly and Tony’ had gained profile in national radio circles. A good morning show takes years to put together and it requires a huge financial commitment from the station owner. The job is simple. Draw a large audience to the station in the morning and provide value to advertisers. It may never happen but when it does, it is invaluable to a radio station. Big money is impatient and rather than build a show, sometimes it will just swoop in and ‘buy’ an established one and parachute it into another market. By 1999, we were on top. David came to us with some exciting news.

“Hey guys, how would you like to move to Ottawa?”

“Ottawa. What’s in Ottawa?” I asked.

“A station there wants to hire us. The whole show. For A LOT of money.”

Man, that was exciting. The inquiry alone was professional validation. We were seen as a top rated morning show, good enough for a major market in Canada. David had told us this would happen although I think he would have been happier had the offer come from Calgary or Vancouver, somewhere closer. We didn’t accept the offer but the ins and outs of our final decision misses the point. David was a remarkable broadcaster. He had lived and breathed radio from his youngest days. He knew what good radio was and he knew how to build an excellent morning show and he built ‘David, Kelly and Tony’ literally from scratch. We played our part but make no mistake without David, none of this would have happened. I was just lucky to be in the right place at the right time and smart enough to hang on for dear life for what would turn out to be one of the most exciting and fulfilling experiences of my life. It was quite a ride.

As life will from time to time, it threw David a cruel blow. He fought cancer for over four years. His wife, his faith, his goodness and his humour by his side, David faced his cancer with uncompromising courage. He was part of a groundbreaking beam radiation research project at the BC Cancer Agency in Kelowna. He submitted on a daily basis to examination and testing, radiation and chemotherapy protocols and consults with research oncologists who travelled to Kelowna from throughout the world. It was classic David. Even in the fight of his life selflessly contributing to medical science.

And not once, not one day did David fail to show up for ‘David and Tony K Mornings’ our new morning show on K963. His doctor had told him straight up that he would not be able to work once the treatment kicked in. She had not met David Larsen. No matter how nauseated nor weary he was he showed up every morning. Sometimes, as the cancer progressed David would do a break with me on-air, shut off the mic, double over in pain, and scream out loud. He had no guile, he made up nothing, he simply lived every day honest and true. I had never seen such bravery and I don’t expect to see it again.

To be loved by David Larsen was to be well loved, something few of us can say without some caveat. And David loved his wife and family. We spent thousands of hours together in studios over the twenty-five years together in radio, a place where friendship and candour flourish and David was a model husband. He was never once, not once critical or unkind about his wife or children. When he spoke of her he was joyful, his eyes twinkling. He was loyal, faithful and celebratory of this woman with whom he shared his life, as thankful the day he would speak of her as the day he met her. He showed me how to love well, hands by my side, with humility and honour. My own marriage is the better for him.

So I’ll stop. I have a ‘million’ stories of course but this is about David, not our stories together. Those I have recounted I chose because they give you insight into David. I have known no man like him. I had a nickname for him. I called him ‘Squire’. I think he liked it, he never said otherwise. Nobody else called him ‘Squire’, my sense always was that others recognized it was ours, it was between us.

Well ‘Squire’ I love you. I think about you everyday and regularly look back fondly at all our photos from our time together. You came into my life when I was forty-four, just in the nick of time as it turns out and you changed it. You changed me. And now I have finally said what I have wanted to say since the day you passed away.

I miss you. I love you. Rest in peace.