They organize open houses, recommend paint colors and take our phone calls in the middle of the night. but what do St. Louis realtors do in their precious moments of free time?
[sam hall, dielmann sotheby’s international realty]
You know your pastime is intense when you train for it by completing triathlons. Sam Hall, a Dielmann Sotheby’s International Realty agent, spends his free time climbing mountains. “I’m a competitive person by nature,” he says, a trait that drives him to the top of peaks and local highest-selling agents lists. Hall recently reached the summit of Mt. Kilimanjaro in Tanzania, and is itching to get back on the trail.
The juxtaposition of grueling physicality and mental clarity hooked Hall on the hobby after he scaled his first mountain in Colorado. “You run the full gamut of emotions, from excited anticipation to exhaustion and doubt you can accomplish it to the exhilaration of having done it,” he says. He tackled Mt. Kilimanjaro as his first feat in the seven summits challenge to climb the tallest mountain on each of the seven continents. Wearing a large backpack and a training mask that deprived him of oxygen, Hall prepared in Forest Park by cycling, running and hiking. To discipline his lungs, he did yoga, swam and completed a few triathlons. “The best part was, right before I left, I got to start pigging out, so to speak,” he says. “I was pretty good about my diet leading up to it, but for 10 days I ate anything and everything I could find.”
The physical demands were intense. “Imagine running a marathon every day for six days behind a cement truck oozing debris, uphill the entire way, eating nothing but curried meat and vegetables,” Hall says. But his training paid off: Hall was one of only a few participants who carried his own supplies and didn’t need extra oxygen. The final ascent began at midnight. “You’re hiking through the dark all night, not knowing how close you are to the top, with frozen snot on your nose,” Hall recounts. “You’re having trouble breathing because the air’s so thin. Then you reach the crest of the mountain, see the sun come up, see all the clouds so far beneath you, and it’s a surreal moment of thinking, I literally got here on my own two feet. That was worth all the aggravation.”
Pictured: Hall on Mt. Kilimanjaro
[lucyann boston, laura mccarthy]
Lucyann Boston is not secretly a superhero, but she does her own version of Superman’s quick change in a telephone booth. On Tuesday mornings, her coworkers at Laura McCarthy spot her sneaking into the office in soil-stained gardening gear, only to appear minutes later at their weekly meeting looking poised and polished. Boston is both a real estate agent and a Master Gardener, activities that provide her a balanced blend of stimulation and relaxation.
Boston transitioned into selling real estate after writing about interesting homes during her first career as a journalist. “I sort of had a heads up because I had seen so many different houses,” she says. “I did stories from St. Charles County to Town & Country to the city. I got familiar with a lot of different neighborhoods.” Because of her family’s background in gardening, she picked up the hobby during her free time. “My grandfather on my mom’s side was a vegetable gardener, and my mom was interested in garden clubs,” Boston says. “I grew up on a property where my dad’s dad had planted a lot of things.” Caring for hydrangeas, zinnias and veggies of all types quickly became one of her favorite activities. “Every gardener will tell you it’s therapeutic,” Boston says. “It’s optimistic: When you’re planting bulbs in the fall, you’re hoping daffodils are going to grow in the spring.”
The University of Missouri extension program at the Missouri Botanical Garden offered Boston the opportunity to earn her status as a Master Gardener. There, she learned from from experts, worked with plants of all varieties and took tests to measure her knowledge. “Every Sunday night I’d be studying my botanical names,” she says. She maintains her affiliation by putting in 50 hours of volunteer work annually.
That community service requirement is why Boston finds herself rising early on Tuesday mornings to work with herbs at the Garden with the St. Louis Herb Society. She weeds, prunes and waters the aromatic plants before driving to work in time for the agent meeting. And when Boston’s two worlds collide, her coworkers don’t mind at all: “One time we had to cut back rosemary, and I took a whole load of rosemary to the office,” she says.
[jennifer guffey, prudential select properties]
Sometimes a wonderful hobby originates from tragic circumstances. Jennifer Guffey immediately knew something was wrong with her newborn son when his yellow skin seemed more severe than a typical case of jaundice. Doctors diagnosed him with biliary atresia, an inflammation and blockage of the bile ducts that leads to cirrhosis of the liver. “For the first two years of his life, I was in the hospital with him,” Guffey says. “I would sit there and Google the disease, but I found nothing hopeful.” So she decided to make a website full of information and positive stories to help families in similar situations. After a liver transplant, her son now is thriving, as is BA Aware, the nonprofit Guffey founded to support biliary atresia research.
Helping families find homes is Guffey’s favorite part of the real estate business, and a similar impulse drives her to devote countless hours to managing BA Aware. “It’s been a great way to give back,” she says. For the organization’s main fundraiser, Art For A Cure, local artists donate original pieces to be auctioned off to support liver transplants and biliary atresia research at St. Louis Children’s Hospital. Guffey expects the next art auction, July 25 at Blind Tiger in Maplewood, to attract more than 250 people. BA Aware had Dec. 1 designated National Biliary Atresia Awareness Day, during which its website solicits online donations. Guffey is proud to report that last year, the group registered more than 100 people to be organ donors. And so many people are interested in its mission that the nonprofit now has branches in Austin, Texas, and Los Angeles.
Seeing her 4-year-old son live a normal life (with the help of medication) and hearing positive feedback from other families makes all Guffey’s efforts worthwhile, she says. “I get emails every week saying, ‘Thank you for putting this site together, this is so helpful. That’s unmeasurable to me. I very vividly can remember the feelings when sitting in that hospital. If I can alleviate that for anyone else, I’ve served my purpose.”
By Rebecca Koenig