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Hi Classmates!
I like this picture. The baggy old coat hides the baggy old body.
The shadow from the hat hides the baggy old eyes. And the hat keeps
the sun off the top of the baggy old head, where in recent years, I
have been cutting the hair very short. Very short indeed.
For those who have asked, the
job count has remained at 67, ranging from dishwasher at the Purdue
Memorial Union, to CEO of a plastics manufacturing company, with
some interesting, and sometimes profitable stops in between. I have
moved 27 times. Been to 3 colleges and 5 trade schools, and
actually graduated from some of them. I have a degree from Purdue
in 3 dimensional visual design, which hasn't been too useful, but
was a lot of fun to obtain. Served in Viet Nam. Been around the
world. Married once and engaged once, though not to the same
woman. No kids.
I presently have a residential
appraisal business in Lafayette, own half an appraisal company in
Kealakekua, Kona, Hawaii (Right off the Mamalahoa Highway. Boy, I
love that language!), and own some income properties. All stuff I
have stumbled into through no skill of my own, but by the grace of
God, or the laws of probability, or the will of the Great Hairy
Thunderer, or whatever you personally believe.
I don't think it is likely that
I will retire, since I can work as much or as little as I would like
to in this job, and since it keeps me in touch with the local
community, and a lot of old friends. Anyway, the word "retire" just
scares the heck out of me.
I spend most of my time
appraising, and working on an old house I purchased in recent
years. I have repaired the roof of the house, and the foundation is
sound, so now all I have to do is repair or replace nearly
everything in between the two. I have estimated completion for 12
years after the expiration of my life expectancy.
I am occasionally dating a
woman who is probably too young for me, and we have both decided
that our relationship has absolutely no future. But we have also
decided that we have a lot of fun together and we will take
advantage of that while it lasts. Relationships are surprisingly
stress free when you know ahead of time that they won't work out!
I do a little hilly water and
flat water kayaking, though not as much as I would like to do. I
love to travel, and will manufacture excuses to get in the car and
go. I try to get to Hawaii a couple of times a year, since I can
now write it off as a business expense. (Unless the IRS is
monitoring this site. If that is the case, I am only making a joke,
and would never dream of really writing it off as a business
expense.) I still fool around a little with art, though I no longer
make any income from it. I have a cat I "inherited" when my mother
passed away, and she is an excellent roommate, makes no demands, and
only claws me bloody a couple of times a week. I enjoy any excuse
to be outdoors, except work. But my favorite thing is still yacking
with people. I love picking people's brains...hearing what they
think...what stupid things they have done (And seeing how they
compare to the stupid things I have done.)...where they have
been...what they have seen...and particularly what makes them
laugh. People are pretty neat, and I am grateful for having had the
opportunity to have known so many of them from such a broad spectrum
of our society.
When we left WLHS, the only
thing I aspired to was a decent job that would pay the bills and
leave a little left over, and, especially, my own family. The
former I have accomplished, off and on with varying degrees of
success, but the latter I have never gotten very close to. I won't
complain, though. My youth probably qualified as "misspent" (Come
on. You were all thinking it!), and the course of my life has
certainly been unplanned and at times pretty unexpected. However,
while life hasn't always been as good as I would have hoped, I have
never been bored, and for that I am incredibly grateful.
So far, life has been a heck of
a trip, and I am still as curious as ever to see what is around the
next corner!
Of course, I am still trying to
decide what I want to be when I grow up. Anybody else have that
problem?
For those of you who have been
away for a long time, West Lafayette is no longer that fairy tale
place in which we grew up. Wow! It really was a fairy tale, wasn't
it? But it is still a nice community, and you will still find a lot
of your cherished memories here. I hope to see you all at the
reunion!
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