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Pat and I met Steve and Sue Ann in 1986 when the Gwinnett Fellowship was meeting at the Winn Russell House on old Highway 29 in Lilburn. It wasn't long before they invited us to join members of the congregation for a weekend at The Mountain, The Unitarian Universalist Camp in Highlands, North Carolina. It was there, that we really got to know them, and I will always think of Steve when I visit there. One of the best ways to really get to know someone is to work side by side with them for awhile. I had the honor of working with Steve many times over the last 14 years. One of the first opportunities was at the annual "Surf and Turf" weekend up in Highlands. The lucky folk at those weekends were the ones who got to work in the kitchen preparing the Saturday steak and seafood dinner. As the chef, Steve was the leader who kept us all on task, but we laughed an awful lot as the afternoon wore on. Steve usually opened a bottle of champagne or we'd get into the beer and wine, and great conversations ensued as we shucked corn, skewered shrimp and ran preview samples past all the workers. Following dinner, high-level Trivial Pursuit games were always played late into the night. The Mountain was also where Steve became a charter member of a group called "The Gwinnett Deck Builders." The Mountain thrives on lots of volunteer labor, and starting back in about 1988 Steve recruited a group of men (and later women too) to visit Highlands whenever there was a large building project to be tackled. As a Mountain Rep, Steve talked me into going along on the first project, a front deck surrounding one of the staff trailers. It was completed over the course of a cold and rainy weekend, but nobody complained, as we were all bonding, becoming better friends, and improving our building skills as well. Not too long after that, Steve and Sue Ann asked Pat and I to take over the job of being Mountain Reps. Over the years, Steve was always ready to join the Deck Builders, tearing up the old rec hall, building a 100 ft. long handicap ramp, and then eventually putting those skills, and us, to work on repairing and expanding the deck at Steve and Sue-Ann's house. Steve put in many, many hours on the construction of our congregation's new building as well. He often spent his Wednesday off here during the half year of construction. As always, we would have lengthy conversations about politics, or religion, or serving on too many committees, while all the work was getting done. On one particular day, Pat and I were laying tile floors in the bathrooms and carrying on our usual conversation with Steve who was working up on the firewall in the minister's office. Our conversation was suddenly interrupted by a crash which Pat and I immediately realized was Steve's ladder. We both ran to the office and found Steve, lying on the concrete floor, tangled in the ladder, and not moving. For a moment, I think we both thought he was dead. He wasn't, and within a few minutes we had separated Steve from the ladder and he was ready to set the ladder back up and go back to work. We talked him into sitting down for a few minutes, and as we sat on the floor we spotted a large dent in the wall of the office. After a few minutes discussion we realized that what we had was a perfect imprint of Steve's back-end. He climbed back up the ladder and went back to work, and like so much else he did here, Steve left a lasting impression. Not all the projects we worked on were physical, I also had the pleasure of serving on the Ministerial Search Committee for more than a year with Steve. I could always count on his counsel as he provided a voice of reason and calmness, that I came to appreciate as sage wisdom. I always considered it a privilege to work side by side with Steve, even when he dressed in native garb to light the poolside tiki torches at a luau dinner. Here at UUCG, and especially in Highlands, I know that I'll really miss his laughter and conversation as I find myself looking at, and remembering, everything that we did together. |
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I'm Paul Glouton, a veterinarian in Lilburn. Steve and I have been together for a long time. We both came to Gwinnett County at the same time. We both had purchased solo practices, young practices--his in Norcross, mine in Lilburn, right about the same time. We both had graduated from Midwest Veterinary colleges. That cold weather to talk about. I guess that kind of drew us together. We spent a lot of time on the phone talking with each other as mutual support, because we didn't have a lot of classmates in the area that we could talk to. So, we were constantly calling each other, talking about either difficult cases, a second opinion, problems in the practice, or how to handle clients. How we were going to pay the bills tomorrow was another big one that we talked about frequently too. It was really a lot of fun talking back and forth and having somebody to talk to. And, of course, I would hear Steve and Steve would hear me. And, now as I think about it, I was pretty dull and mundane compared to Steve. All of my patients walked in the door on all fours. You know, Steve's either crawled in, they slithered in, they flew in, they did everything. It was always a joy to go over to his practice because it was like visiting Noah's ark. My practice, you'd come in and there were dogs and cats and maybe a bunny now and then. But Steve had this special skill and talent with exotics. And you'd go there and there were all sorts of animals everywhere. So many times, I can just remember talking to him on the phone and he would be talking about this problem or that--always upbeat to the outside world. One day we were discussing something and he said, "You know, my nose hurts." And I said, "Well, what do you mean, Steve?" And he said, "My nose, it really hurts." And I said, "Steve, what happened?" And he said, "Well, I was examining a parrot this morning and I got too close to it. It got hold of my nose with its beak and it wouldn't let go." It's not a problem that I deal with in a normal day. Another time I was talking to him on the phone. We were talking and all of a sudden he said, "I've got to go." He put the phone down. I didn't think anything of it because a lot of times we would have emergencies. We were single practitioners and an emergency walks in the door--well, you drop what you're doing and you go take care of that. And I thought nothing of it. He called me back about 20 minutes later and says, "Gosh, I'm sorry to hang up on you." He said, "Well, there was a snake that got lose in the practice and we had to go find it before it got hidden too well." So, it was just one thing after another in talking to him. He was my entertainment, for sure. We also talked of staff problems. In practice--you know, nobody else ever has staff problems, but some of us do have staff problems now and then. I think I talked to Steve about my staff problems because he didn't have any. He used to say, "When your mother is your receptionist and your office manager, you don't have any problems. You just do what she tells you to do and everything is okay." And that was about it. Steve had a fantastic mother. We all loved her to death and I know he did too. Steve had special listening skills. He was so different. I mean, he was so helpful to me so many times. I would call him up on the phone. He was never judgmental. You could say whatever you wanted. He would never tell you what, but he would ask you questions. He would say, "Well, what do you think?" And sometimes I would think, gosh, why didn't I think about going in that direction. And then when you came to a decision, there was no judgment. It was just, okay, if that's what you want to do. And then, you always had to apply the fairness test. His family, I'm sure, knows about this too. Whatever decision you made, it had to be fair and equitable to everybody. Not only just me or him, it had to be fair to the person on the other side. He used to always say, "Well now, if you were on the other side of the table, would you be happy with this decision?" If you even thought for a minute the decision was not fair, then we ought to rethink this and let's go through this again. I think that was a special skill and talent that Steve had. He was such a part of the veterinarian support system. It was not just me. Paul and Janice Cleland, another local veterinarian and husband and wife team who now live in Colorado were by the other day. Paul and Janice were telling me the same thing, that Steve was so great, especially in the early years when we were by ourselves, that we talked so often. He helped everybody, as you in his congregation know for sure. He was a very helpful man. Just a couple of things I'd like to say about Steve. When I think of the attributes of Steve, I think, number one, he was a devoted family man--husband, father, son, brother. Steve, at every opportunity, and those of you in this congregation and those who have worked with him everywhere know, he was so proud of his family--his children, his wife, his brother. I knew what you guys were doing all the time. I think I probably knew more than you knew what you were doing because he talked about it all the time. He made the sacrifices. I can think of more than once when he told me, well, the practice is going to be closed in the afternoon. Can you cover for me, because the girls are having a soccer game and I want to go to the soccer game? And he went. I remember another time when he did not attend a fairly important board meeting one night and he said, "Well, it's Sue-Ann's birthday and I'm taking her out for birthday dinner tonight and you guys decide what needs to be done." I think those of you in his congregation probably saw that same thing. He was a quiet and unassuming man. I'm kind of surprised that you talked about him dancing and all these other things. I never saw that. I guess there was a side of him that I didn't see that way, because most of us in the veterinarian community thought of Steve as a very quiet and very unassuming man. He was great to get in there and do the work, do whatever had to be done. But then when the accolades were to be given, he was always in the shadows. He did not want to be there and do that. He was just so great on getting everything done. Rev. West talked about all the things he did in the church and in the community, but trust me, he did that and then some in the veterinarian community. All of us veterinarians know that when we needed to get something done, Steve Soloway was the man to get it done. It would be done right and it would be done on time. Steve was very serious but he also had a sense of humor. I think it has been alluded to already. It was kind of a dry sense of humor. Those of us who are veterinarians, most of us don't do a lot of exotics work like Steve did. He was just so talented in that area. So, anytime we would get together; we were always kind of prodding him for a little information on exotics. Steve was always so gracious to give us whatever we wanted, whenever we wanted. He seemed glad to give the information. I remember just a couple of months ago, we were at a meeting. Beforehand, there were about five or six of us sitting around talking and we were kind of prodding him on exotics information. I think one of us asked him a probably really dumb and stupid question. He gave us some off the wall quick answer that sounded very authoritarian. The rest of us just kind of looked around at each other. We started to look at him to say, "Really." And just before we said that, you see the big grin starting to come out and he said, "Just kidding guys, just kidding." He was great about that. You talked about him being professional and ethical and adhering to Robert's Rules of Order. Well, we as veterinarians believe me, we knew about Robert's Rules of Order from Steve. He was there with it all the time. And he would not have anything less than the proper way, which is the way it was. That was Steve's life, proper. We do it the right way. Compassionate to both people and animals--as was talked about before. But I can't help but talk about that. Steve did all in his power to alleviate pain and suffering and improve the betterment of animals, whether they slithered, walked, crawled--it didn't matter to Steve. He took care of them. And he had the knowledge to do that. He was an especially skilled veterinarian, particularly with the exotics. He was so good at that area, there were an awful lot of people who depended on him for that information. In addition to the animals, Steve knew how to take care of the people. Most people think that as veterinarians, all you have to do is to love animals and know how to have skill with animals. But that's not the case. Not too many animals walk into your clinic, although probably a few monkeys walked themselves into Steve's practice, but most of the time the clients have to bring them in. Steve was so good and enjoyed so much helping people, in addition to the animals. That was the other half of the equation with Steve. It didn't matter whether you helped the animal if you didn't help the person; you didn't do your job. And he was so good at it. We will all miss Steve. I, for one, am going to continue remembering all the things he did that touched my life and made it better. And I think there are an awful lot of veterinarians in this room that can say the same thing. His was a full and wonderful life, that brought so much joy and laughter to all of us. In fact, I'll bet you that I can see him sitting up there now, looking down at us, his arms crossed, grinning, and just looking at us and thinking, now you guys are going to get to take care of all those monkeys, snakes, gerbils, rabbits, everything. And of course, we're all thinking, oh no, what are we going to do. We're going to miss him. He was such a special talent and we'll miss him. And we do still love him immensely. Thank you. |