The Life Story of a Little Boy Called Miracle

This is the life account of my happy but interrupted childhood in the Kingdom of Yugoslavia (feudal system, fascism, post-war struggles with Tito's Yugoslavian Communism), my journey from my homeland to Germany and, finally, my immigration to Canada (democracy!).

Marshall Tito was a Communist leader for the partisans, resisting German and Italian occupation in the territory of Yugoslavia (1941–'45). He ruled the country until his death in the early '80s. This was actually foretold to me when I was seven years old by an old gypsy woman who frequently visited my Grandma Baker by reading her palm and then mine, where a long road of adventure and a very hard but successful life began, filled with all the gifts and good friends that led to many rewarding enterprises and a beautiful family and home.

I was blessed and lucky: a community pioneer, active in sports, a member of community organizations, builder of a Catholic Church, married to a beautiful wife, father of two lovely daughters. And then, years later, tragedy struck my family. First, my wife and I separated and I became Mr. Mom. Then my older daughter Tania got mauled by a tiger and died, leaving two children, Adrienne and Nicholas. Nine years later, my younger daughter Vesna was murdered, and to top it all off I was diagnosed with terminal bone cancer: 8–12 months to live. 

I survived it all. Eight months later, my doctors, Dr. Kay and Dr. Miller, called me a miracle. I was born on November 9, 1931. This is where it all began, and the gypsy woman did not miss very much.