AC_1965_Web

156 AN T I OC H CO L L E G E C L A S S O F 19 6 5 5 0 t h A N N I V E R S A R Y B O O K S T O C K T O N mine from Penn Mutual. I then in- corporated myself as an indepen- dent software consultant for my fi- nal two years in IT in the“Year 2000 Arena.” My years in IT were varied, in- teresting, and challenging—many different machines, languages, tech- nologies. Assignments ranged from computer programming (systems and applications), systems analysis, software design/development/imple- mentation, database design/file con- version, project management, feasi- bility studies, data administration and consulting. For Matrix I did much of the above for industries varying from manufacturing (steel, paper), publish- ing (books, clinical studies, medical abstracts) to financial (banking, insur- ance and mutual funds). My most interesting and chal- lenging consulting assignment was four years at Scott Paper as the sole IT support for a highly visible batch and online consumer sales statistics system used daily by senior corpo- rate and operational management to track daily, monthly, and yearly sales figures. Each day I felt as if I were leaping over water-filled pot holes, never knowing if they were two inches deep or ten feet. Matrix pro- vided an eight-week paid vacation/ sabbatical which (unfortunately) ended my Scott Paper assignment. My son Peter (13 years old) and I then left on a 10,000-mile 7½ week road trip west. Scott Paper called wanting me back the day I returned to work but Matrix already had me out on another assignment; I would have enjoyed going back. Oh,well... Then, in 1999, when my Year 2000 repair contract ended and I was stressing about “what’s next?,” Peter decided he had no interest in attend- ing college. WOW!! I no longer needed to make the big bucks AND my “large mainframe computer” skill set was not currently in demand AND I was burned-out AND I had other fish to fry, SO... I fried them! When I stepped away from computing I continued develop- ing a Nikken business (multilevel health and wellness) that was show- ing great potential. However, in January 2002, I brought my mother to Philadelphia to convalesce after a fall and pneumonia. She never was able to return to her home in Sunset Park (Brooklyn) and spent her last three years here. As my 401(k) dis- appeared (stock market collapse, pre-age-59½ tax penalties, living ex- penses) and my Nikken business dis- solved from lack of attention and in- terest, it was time to think out of the box. So I became a truck driver. I went to school, got my CDL, and spent four years driving the lower 48 states,mostly for USATruck (white trucks with what looks like the Air Force emblem on their side). As a solo driver, I lived in my truck, drove 125,000 miles a year, parked overnight at truck stops, rest areas and shippers. I made it home maybe eight times each year, spent my other home time volunteering at the Philadelphia Folk Festival or Antioch Reunion Alumni Work Project. I drove from ages 62 through 66 and call it my “Senior Crisis.” Truck driv- ing was VERY hard work (for me)— with comparatively rotten pay, but I met my objective and got my mort- gage paid! I stopped driving in October 2008. Five days later I identified my current occupation, seasonal tax pre- parer, which I’ve continued every January throughApril. I also did 2010 Census work and a “driving” job to verify home delivery of weekly shop- ping/advertising circulars. And I work the polls twice a year as Judge of Elections in my division. THE REST OF MY LIFE I never married nor mated. I bought my first house in 1972 in Germantown, cooperatively with four others. We were yuppies in a day when it meant young URBAN PIONEER (before it became yump- ies (young UPWARDLY MOBILE PROFESS IONALS). We moved to Germantown to make a difference, to help bring a distressed neighbor- hood back. And we did, somewhat. Over my 13 years there,my partners and I rehabilitated five distressed and/or abandoned houses.We kept seven people in our house, a cook for each day of the week. It worked out great. Home cooked meals ev- ery night of the week and we each had kitchen duty only once a week. I lived there 6½ years before I needed more personal space. I made plans to move and happily discovered I had succeeded in getting pregnant— at age 37, six weeks after FINALLY quitting smoking (it only took me 18 years to quit)! I named my son Peter. I think he was up there on that cloud say- ing “Mom, Mom, when are you going to get it together and let me come down?” since, after all, that knight in T-shirt I donated to Antiochiana October 2014. Amy Wescott gave me this shirt when she co-oped in Philly. I wore it during many work projects. A B C D E F G H I J K L M N O P Q R S T U V W X Y Z