As part of my Class of 76 reunion stuff, we have started posting a short (though with me it never is) account of what we have been doing since graduating from HighSchool. It was actually kind of fun to think back over the last 35 years and highlight the important things. Which really aren’t the important things. Well except for the marriages,divorces,births and deaths. The job history which is sort of how it seems we define our lives in terms of timeline is pretty secondary to the other stuff, for me anyway. But interesting. And I think it gives a picture of our interests. Though I think that for a lot of people their job is not necessarily what they are passionate about. Anyway,I thought I would post it today in my blog because so many of you are not classmates from 1976. This “exercise” though got my creative mind going…and so at some point I am going to do a timeline of something other than job history,school history. I am going to do a people history and reflect on people who have made a significant difference in my life. Here it is…a cliffnote version of my last 35 years.
Where do I begin….I was born in ..oh wait, since high school right? Ok so I went to OSU for 3 years and took classes in Business because I had no idea whatsoever what I wanted to do…I do remember that I was going to put off speech class until my last semester because I was terrified of public speaking. Which is so ironic because now if I could have any job in the world it would be as a humorist/public speaker, stand up comedian. Not sure how I got to the point that I am most comfortable with a mike in my hand in front of a crowd but I know that I love it and hope to continue to do it every chance I get.I dropped out of OSU in 1979 and married classmate Earl Thomas in 1980. We moved to Red River, NM the day after our wedding because Earl wanted to work in a ski resort. I went to work at the Red Onion restaurant as a waitress (not a good job choice for clumsy me ) but it helped pay the bills and we got to ski everyday so it was really a fun time. When the ski season wound down we moved back to Oklahoma and got real jobs. I worked as an oil and gas accounting clerk for Sohio Petroleum in OKC
Earl and I divorced in early 1983 and I moved to Houston with Sohio Petroleum and married Mike Byers in October of that year. We lived in Houston for about a year then moved to Dallas where I went to work as in an accounting job at a corporation that made computer chips that employed a lot of Vietnamese /Asian workers and thus smelled like fish all the time (that being what they ate for lunch everyday). We did get a paid holiday on Chinese New Year which was unusual and made up for the fish smell. (I hate fish btw).
In November 1985 my son Chris was born and in January of 1986 we moved to Kingfisher so that Mike could help my dad with his trencher business. I got my Property and Casualty insurance license and worked for Throckmorton Insurance as a commercial lines agent for about a year. Then I decided I wanted to be home with Chris so I quit and was a stay at home mom for a while. In February, 1988 my son Andy was born.
In May of 1989 we moved to Muskogee where Mike had grown up and he went to work for his dad’s company and I went to work part time in various insurance agencies. In 1991, I went to work for a Marketing Company based in Chicago and for the next 8 years worked as a Manager for them. This job was awesome as I got to travel all over the U.S. as a corporate trainer. The company bid jobs for various displays, etc in retail chains. So my job was to meet with the clients, learn the reset or display set and then fly around training managers in various locations who then trained the reset teams. I worked from my home and so I had the best of both worlds. I was the President of the PTO at my kids school , a cub scout den mother , soccer mom some days and a Corporate Trainer flying around the country in my business suit the next.
In 1999 I had some health issues and took a year off to recuperate and work on my writing. The idea was to finish one of the many manuscripts I have started. 11 years later they are still not done! In 2000 Mike and I separated and were divorced in 2001. I went to work for the Farmers Insurance District manager in Muskogee and that job evolved into property management and accounting for 8 Subway Shops he owned. I also went back to school in 2001 to complete my degree in Marketing/ Public Relations. About the time the owner retired in October of 2004 and laid everyone off, my mom had taken a turn for the worse in her cancer battle and I was in my last semester of college. I spent the remainder of that year going to school and going to Kingfisher every week to be with my mother. She died December 12, 2004 and I graduated from NSU in Tahlequah on December 18. Bittersweet day.
I went to work for Trinity Hospice of Checotah in March 2005 as a volunteer coordinator and admissions specialist. In May of 2006 I was promoted to Director of Operations (fancy name for business manager) of the Tahlequah office. In December 2008 the company was bought by Horizon Hospice and I split my time between Checotah and Tahlequah offices until December or 2010. I am now only at the Checotah office.
I had always been told I was funny and had long wanted to try Standup comedy. So in December of 2009 I entered a talent show at the casino in Muskogee. Though I didn’t win I was completely hooked. The experience was exhilarating. Since then I have performed every chance I get. I am still single, divorced for 11 years. I have had a few short term relationships and one 5 year relationship that should have been done in 2…but that’s another story. In my spare time I write,perform comedy, sing in the Church Choir, play handbells and make frequent trips to Austin where my son Chris now lives. My son Chris is married to an wonderful girl named Juliet who he married on 7/7/07. No grandkids yet. My son Andy is getting ready to move to Dallas so I will make trips there too I'm sure. That’s about it. And now you know a little bit. Stay tuned for the rest of the story. LOL
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