I normally give you some insight into the upbringing of the people I write about. Not so with Ira Scherr: I’ve got just two things. He was born in Philly in 1950, and he describes his childhood like this: “What’s the difference between a Jewish mother and a vulture? A vulture waits until you’re dead before it eats your heart out.”

With that, let’s forge ahead.

As a young man, Ira traveled the country, from Maine to California. He was a free spirit, enjoying the freedom that comes with youth. People helped, giving him food stamps, government cheese (a marker for our generation), a dog. He worked a variety of jobs – picking cherries, cleaning antiques, and lumberjacking in the Olympic Peninsula. “I was a chaser. It was my job to scramble downhill, wrap a cable around a felled tree, and get out of the way while a tractor dragged it up.”

Ira made it to Woodstock, another marker for our generation. “I left because it was a disaster, we were three miles from the music.”

Two years later, while still on the road, Ira got the call from home. His dad had a heart attack and was about to have a bypass. Ira bought an old Volvo, punched some holes in the roof so he could strap his belongings to the top, and got back home, just in time. His dad had a stroke during the surgery and died two weeks later.

“Now what am I going to do?” Ira asked himself. This was a reset, a gamechanger. He did what many young men did at the time, enlisting in the Navy, the branch least likely to go to Viet Nam. He spent his Navy time in San Diego, where he was trained as a Corpsman, learning to provide medical care to sailors and Marines. “I was trained mostly in matters concerning the eye, and I worked in Intensive Care Units, Ear-Nose-Throat clinics, and in operating rooms.”

Ira came to Colorado in 2016, at the age of 66. His daughter, her husband, and their kids had a small farm in the flats. They needed help. Ira did it all, cleaning, cooking, taking care of the kids, the goats, the ducks, hanging certain plants out to dry.

For two years, anyway. Until, while swiping through the Plenty Of Fish dating site, he found Linda. A very fortunate find.

“We asked each other a lot of questions, until we felt comfortable. She was honest, smart, and she liked me. She worked, and still works, as a page at the Gilpin Library. After a few months of courting we were living together, in Dory Lakes.”

It was hard for Ira to adapt to the elevation, but he was excited to be in the mountains, away from the crowds and the smog. He took a job at BlackJack Pawn, just outside of Black Hawk. It was a good job, but after a year, Ira started having trouble walking up stairs. It made his chest hurt.

Ira saw a VA cardiologist, who ordered an immediate stress test. They weren’t long into it when the cardiologist told the tech to stop. To Ira, she said, “You’re not going home, the cardiac surgeon will be here in an hour.” His aortic valve had calcified (look – another generational marker!) and they were going to replace it with a cow valve.

Which they did. Ira did well and was discharged from the hospital early. He walked a lot at home, and he volunteered at the Backdoor Theatre in Ned, until the COVID came. He was on top of the world until 2021, when he blacked out while driving. It was, and I hate to keep throwing these generational markers at you, a stroke. Left frontal lobe.

With Linda’s help (her mantra is “whole foods – hydration – movement”), he recovered after a year and a half. Ira had to ask himself, as he did fifty years before, “Now what am I going to do?”

Some might think the options for a 73 year old, fresh off a stroke, would be limited. Not Ira, for him the answer was obvious: go back to school and become a medical assistant.

I know, but it’s true! Ira applied for financial aid and enrolled in Pima Medical Institute’s Medical Assistant program. It’s a nine month, $18,000 endeavor. The financial aid isn’t nearly enough, so he plans to set up a Go Fund Me page to pay for the rest of his education.

“I’m 50 yrs older than most students, yet it’s not an issue for anyone. I’m kicking ass there. As a Certified Medical Assistant, I’m the assistant to the doctor, short of being a nurse. I can test patients, set things up, do the books and the payroll. I’m especially interested in emergency care – you see everything, you learn so much.”

There are easy ways to finish this story. “It’s never too late.” “Never say die.” “Don’t stop fighting,” All too trite, I think, at least if you have met this man, as I have. I’m going with this instead, from the heart: Kudos to you Ira, you’re a hell of a guy.