How Far Do You Want to Go?

“A few hours after I was born, my father, Andreas Catsimatidis, took me to the house of his mother, who hadn’t been well. He carried me into the bedroom and handed me to my *Ya-Ya,* which is what Greek children call their grandmothers. Without a word of prompting, she said to my father, “A new Yiánni Catsimatidis is born.” That was her late husband’s name, Yiánni—Greek for John. And that night, my grandmother died. That very night. She was happy the whole day long.”

“It’s the tale of an immigrant pip-squeak, a scrappy city kid who reaches the highest heights of the American Dream and still keeps reaching for more.”

“These days, I don’t think of myself as a Democrat or a Republican. I’m just a common-sense billionaire.”

“What a wonderful accident of geography and history: none of it could have happened anywhere but here and now. And I’m not done yet.”

“That was the world I grew up in: twentieth-century immigrant New York. My life began with learning English; making friends; playing stoopball, stickball, and Johnny-on-a-Pony on the sidewalks of West Harlem. Obeying my parents and studying hard, like a dutiful child should. Climbing through public school and Greek school and all-boys Brooklyn Tech. Learning to hustle, learning to lead, picking up side jobs along the way. Buying my first car. Getting my college diploma—*almost*. Disappointing my parents by walking away from a promising professional career. Then turning a small grocery store into a sprawling New York empire that boasted some of supermarketing’s proudest names. Discovering that I liked doing business and had a knack for it. Who knew? Expanding the business. Expanding the business some more. Meeting”

“That volcano—the flames, the heat, the smoke, the tar-and-ash aroma—looms over everything and everyone on Nisyros. Always has and always will. The volcano isn’t currently spewing lava, but it has erupted at least thirteen times in recorded history. It’s also a cause of the island’s many earthquakes. With an active volcano on such a small island, it’s impossible to forget how powerful nature is and how unpredictable life can be. Clearly, some forces greater than ourselves influence our destinies.”

“My parents never considered themselves poor or oppressed or downtrodden. Why should they have? They had ambition. They had hard work. They had each other. And they also had me, their first and only child, a brand-new generation to carry their dreams forward. America was the land of opportunity. Lucky for us, we were here.”

“God knows my mind is constantly racing forward, always filled to the brim.”

“Rising to the highest levels of the Democratic Party, then rising to the highest levels of the Republican Party (how many people can say that?). Giving millions and millions of dollars away. Thinking of running for mayor, then actually doing it.”

““The unexamined life is not worth living,” the ancient Greek philosopher Socrates supposedly said. The truth is we don’t know if Socrates really said that. The great teacher didn’t write anything down. All we have to go by are the reports from Plato and other star students. But I’m inclined to believe what they say. I like examining things, my own life included. That’s how I improve myself. That’s what I’ve always done: look at the situation, whatever it is, turn my brainpower on it, and then try to solve the issues that I find. That’s how I built my businesses. That’s how I’ve run my life.”

“. Getting into aviation, energy, real estate, insurance, and investments—and why stop there? Learning to count in millions, then in billions.”

“Realizing that the sunshine of my life was sitting right beside me. Starting a family with her”

“In the pages that follow, I will share it all with you: the thrills, the excitement, the sense of adventure, and the wonderful people I have gotten to know and the distances all of us have come. There are twists and turns and lessons learned, and they are still flying at me.”

““Your life is the stuff of drama and mythology,” my friends keep saying to me. “What kind of drama?” I ask. “Comedy or tragedy? What kind of mythology? Greek or American?””

“I had a dream the other night. I was a character in the movie *Planet of the Apes,* the original and still the best of the series. I was walking along a river. I wasn’t sure where I was. Crazy stuff was happening all around me. Then I looked up and saw the Statue of Liberty. I knew I was in New York, the center of everything, that place of endless possibilities, where the future really does live in your head and your hands. That image focused me. It motivated me. I knew it was time to take care of business, time to get busy writing this book.”

“The Greeks have stories to explain everything, and I do mean *everything.* There’s a famous story in Greek mythology about Nisyros, the rugged but beautiful little island in the Aegean Sea where I was born. The hero of this story is Poseidon, the fearless god of the sea. During the epic battle between the gods and the Titans, Poseidon frantically chases after the giant Polyvotis, finally catching up with him on the island of Kos. It is there, in a flash of righteous fury and fortunate aim, that Poseidon supposedly chops off part of Kos with his three-pronged trident and hurls the chunk of rock and earth at Polyvotis, smacking the fleeing giant in the back of the head and sinking him to the bottom of the sea. Poseidon’s lucky strike became Nisyros.”

“Nisyros is far less developed than the Greek islands you’ve probably seen in person or on tourist web sites. Barely five miles across, it is part of a chain of small islands, the Dodecanese, scattered like pepper flakes between the vibrant coasts of Greece and Turkey. There’s a small harbor, some cliffs, and a few modest farms. The unspoiled terrain is dotted with churches, forts, small white houses with blue windows, and, along the seventeen-mile coastline, a handful of small tavernas serving fresh squid, octopus, and other delicious creatures pulled that morning from the sea. Everybody knows everybody.”

““We want our island the way it’s always been,” they say, and they mean it. The population has shrunk over the decades as people have migrated, mostly to America. But other than that, Nisyros has stayed pretty much the same. The people fish and farm and love talking with friends and family late into the night.”