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Sep 29, 2006 1:51 pm |
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How may I help you today ... ? |
James Booth
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The who what why and where of - jamonbo -
My real full name is James Monroe Booth (jaMES monROE boOTH). I would have been Monroe Phillippi Booth III except my Dad's best friend was lost when the Reuben James sank in the Atlantic (Dad served only in Pacific). Dad was on Iwo Jima when I was born - worst of the fighting over, Navy personnel were called onshore to help rebuild the landing strip and just about anything which needed done there. Dad joined Navy in 1939, served 21 years as aircraft electrician, retiring in 1960 as CPO, Instructor.
My parents met in May, 1944 and married July 4, 1944. A Railway Express driver then, Mom gave Dad a lift one day, and apparently they liked each other - then. She did not see him (nor did I) from the end of July that year until after VJ Day - after August 1945. Mom was the first of the "fair sex" (quoting news clipping) issued a chauffeur's license in Sonoma County, Cafilornia - daughter of a dairyman, she was a natural born veterinarian who carried a catalog of plant names and uses in her head and could identify almost any creature anyone brought home. Mom spoke kindly of just about everyone other than Navy doctors.
By the time I began First Grade in Jacksonville FL I had already moved from Alameda CA to Whidbey Island WA and back, and been across the U.S. three times by car and train. After being moved from two other rooms, it was finally decided Miss Crabtree would be my FG teacher. Within a week I pointed out to the entire class that the calendar she was explaining to us was wrong - that Sunday should be the last day of the week instead of the first ... from what little I knew at that point of the Bible. If that is confusing to you, ask me ... just that from then on, I was more cautious about asking questions or "challenging elders wisdom" shall we say ?
From Jacksonville to Escondido CA, to Hayward and then Fallon NV ... school was a mixture of boredom and surprise. Sitting still for an hour without going to sleep was always a challenge, so I welcomed activities - learning Mexican song and dance, spelling bees which I almost always won, chemistry lab, and band ... the last allowed me some travel, to march in numerous SoCal towns and play in school concerts and games. Having learned to read by the age of 4, history and math became a bore, until I realized two years later I had been missing things I did NOT yet know. In 1960, after a summer living on the side of a mountain near Peter Lassen's grave, I began high school in Susanville CA where I had to choose between band and my new love - the school paper. From proofreader to Sports Editor, I was addicted to the printed page.
As an engineering student, I flunked out of San Jose State, scrapping my AFROTC plans, so enlisted Army for 3 years, 13 weeks Basic at Ft. Puke followed by another 13 weeks of Topographic Surveying at Ft. Belvoir, graduating ahead of most of the Marines in the class ... with orders for First Infantry Division, Saigon - knowing there was NO topographic surveying being done in VN at time. That may have been when I "disconnected" to autopilot, or it might have been well-ingrained before then. After a year in Phuoc Vinh and later, Quan Loi, I turned down a one-year assignment to Monrovia, Liberia - choosing "the devil I knew" for another six months. 10 more months at Ft. Huachuca ended my military service, and I left with no clue what next. My relationship with Dad made me not a good fit with military life, after already having "served 20 years in Navy" while growing up, and I would likely not have done Army had it not been for the Draft.
Never had a "life-goal" or a "burning desire" so I drifted - to Mexico City to SF to Eugene OR, back to Berserkeley and Bay Area in general, on to Madison WI and to Buffalo before returning to San Rafael and communal living - until I injured my hand. That is when I first came to Central Oregon - stayed with family, went to work, back to school, met my wife within a year. Everything came into focus - we purchased property, married, conceived our son, while raising her daughter from a previous marriage. Received a minor degree as one of the last *mechanical* office repair techs in this country - satisfying, but maybe not the smartest of choices, after which I did four years of millwork - always studying people.
I urged my wife to use her talents in sales rather than continuing work in the plywood mills she (and I) had helped "liberate." I quit millwork after four years to run my own firewood business, struggling but enjoying every day, contracting and hiring. By summer of '81 Vicki's RE license was about worthless due to the housing bust here, so we went to Reno and both had work within two days. As an Olivetti technician, I trained customers how to use the equipment, from Reno to Lake Tahoe and Carson City - including state offices. Loved working with the people.
My encouragement led Vicki into banking, specifically RE loan department, then back into sales. My bargain to raise my son did not benefit "career plans" while I worked a wide variety of jobs during the years I was happily married. We divorced January 2001. 30 years ago we finished each other's sentences - now we hardly know what to say to each other, look at things very differently: "Get over it." she says ... and I think, "If I could just 'get over it' it would not have meant as much in the first place."
When Mom's health declined and my sister and I agreed Mom would do better in simpler surroundings here, I soon saw my continuing to work two jobs to pay for what I no longer needed by myself as bordering on insanity, so I quit. Being there for Mom those last three years meant a lot to me - a lot more than what I could have purchased with all the money I might have made. In that time I became aware that I could make income online, and aware that would not happen the way(s) I first thought it would ... but it also occurred to me that I could help others in the same way while rebuilding my own finances, so now I am on a mission, and that is how I come to have too much time to spend with y'all here.
Some days I think how nice it would be to make memories with someone the next 20 years - other days I ask why would I do that. If it is meant to be, it will be. I already have more than I deserve.
JBPrivate Reply to James Booth (new win) |
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