I found an old Good Student Discount form from when I was 16. It had our old address on it.
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Tuesday, December 11, 2007
Monday, August 6, 2007
Brats Homecoming
This weekend I attended a "Overseas Brats Homecoming" that was held in the D/FW Hyatt. I wasn't really looking forward to it. My sister has a friend who said that she was going to come to it and my sis didn't want to go to this event alone. So, we signed up for it months ago. The friend never showed and we were on our own.
High school was not something I look back on fondly. I attended 4 different high schools and just wanted the hell out. I have fond memories of Junior High. We were in Baumholder Germany for three years (7th, 8th & 9th grades), so it was a very good stable time for me.
By the time we moved to Naples Italy, which is where I graduated from high school, I was just burned out on typical High School BS. My senior year, I had an Italian boyfriend who had a car. Much of my time in school was spent waiting until school let out so I could go hang out with him and his family. Lunch time, for me, was spent hiding in my Physics teacher's room reading a book and eating a packed lunch.
So I wasn't really looking forward to this weekend. We didn't know anyone.
But you know what, my sis and I had a great time. If anything, it was a great time spent with my sis. She lives in Valley Ranch, which is fairly close by, but life gets in the way and we just don't get to see each other that much.The other thing that was a little uncomfortable was what to do at the homecoming. Well, the organizers had several hospitality suites set up and everyone hung out in each suite. We visited the Italian suite and the folks there had old year books and photos of Naples. There were several folks there who graduated in 1981. They were a lot of fun and we had similar memories and shared teachers. They also had Italian beer, wine, and espresso.
We also went to the German hospitality suite. The lady who runs GermanDeli.com (which is located here in Southlake) had come up the night before and brought a ton of candy. So their suite was the candy suite. I ended up meeting up with a guy who was in Baumholder when I was there. He was in the grade ahead of me. He had done an incredible job of keeping up with former students. I was amazed. I also met up with my seventh grade English teacher - Mr. Hobbs (H-O-B-B-S). We were his first seventh grade class he'd ever taught as he liked teaching the seniors. It was great meeting him again and just reminded me how much I loved his class and him, too. Turns out he's retired to Tyler. I hope to keep in contact with him as we weren't really able to visit as well as I had wanted to do. We had another guy there who had graduated in 1982. He was very difficult to talk around and my sister and I were amazed that we were as polite to him as we were. He was very closed minded and would make derogatory remarks towards gays (we had several gay teachers overseas, but it was never an issue). He was also very religious and made derogatory remarks toward some of the teachers who taught all those years ago. We were very tolerant of him as we really didn't want to offend him. It would have been nice to be able to talk to Mr. Hobbs without the gentleman there, but alas. . . we couldn't.
It was fun to go. I was surprised at how much fun it was.
Visiting Europe is nice, but living there is a totally different experience. I have, over the years, actively not thought about it because the feelings it brings up sometimes is similar to grieving. I will never live over there and give those experiences to my family. It's difficult to explain, but the people I met at the Homecoming know it all too well.
High school was not something I look back on fondly. I attended 4 different high schools and just wanted the hell out. I have fond memories of Junior High. We were in Baumholder Germany for three years (7th, 8th & 9th grades), so it was a very good stable time for me.
By the time we moved to Naples Italy, which is where I graduated from high school, I was just burned out on typical High School BS. My senior year, I had an Italian boyfriend who had a car. Much of my time in school was spent waiting until school let out so I could go hang out with him and his family. Lunch time, for me, was spent hiding in my Physics teacher's room reading a book and eating a packed lunch.
So I wasn't really looking forward to this weekend. We didn't know anyone.
But you know what, my sis and I had a great time. If anything, it was a great time spent with my sis. She lives in Valley Ranch, which is fairly close by, but life gets in the way and we just don't get to see each other that much.The other thing that was a little uncomfortable was what to do at the homecoming. Well, the organizers had several hospitality suites set up and everyone hung out in each suite. We visited the Italian suite and the folks there had old year books and photos of Naples. There were several folks there who graduated in 1981. They were a lot of fun and we had similar memories and shared teachers. They also had Italian beer, wine, and espresso.
We also went to the German hospitality suite. The lady who runs GermanDeli.com (which is located here in Southlake) had come up the night before and brought a ton of candy. So their suite was the candy suite. I ended up meeting up with a guy who was in Baumholder when I was there. He was in the grade ahead of me. He had done an incredible job of keeping up with former students. I was amazed. I also met up with my seventh grade English teacher - Mr. Hobbs (H-O-B-B-S). We were his first seventh grade class he'd ever taught as he liked teaching the seniors. It was great meeting him again and just reminded me how much I loved his class and him, too. Turns out he's retired to Tyler. I hope to keep in contact with him as we weren't really able to visit as well as I had wanted to do. We had another guy there who had graduated in 1982. He was very difficult to talk around and my sister and I were amazed that we were as polite to him as we were. He was very closed minded and would make derogatory remarks towards gays (we had several gay teachers overseas, but it was never an issue). He was also very religious and made derogatory remarks toward some of the teachers who taught all those years ago. We were very tolerant of him as we really didn't want to offend him. It would have been nice to be able to talk to Mr. Hobbs without the gentleman there, but alas. . . we couldn't.
It was fun to go. I was surprised at how much fun it was.
Visiting Europe is nice, but living there is a totally different experience. I have, over the years, actively not thought about it because the feelings it brings up sometimes is similar to grieving. I will never live over there and give those experiences to my family. It's difficult to explain, but the people I met at the Homecoming know it all too well.
Sunday, April 22, 2007
Where to start
I'm not sure how I should proceed. I guess I should just dive in.
I was a 7 pound preemie, or so I thought for 21 years. My folks met at West Texas State University. My mom graduated with an education degree and my dad, barely, with a Sociology degree. They got married May 1, 1966 and graduated a few weeks later. They stayed in Canyon, Texas while waiting for Dad to be accepted into the Air Force.
Dad is an Air Force Brat, too, and has an interesting up bringing. Bumped around. The usual. Mom is Oil Field Trash. She attended four different high schools, and four different colleges. The VietNam war was going on, and Mom absolutely didn't want him to join the Air Force. But all Dad ever wanted to do was to learn how to fly. His own father was still active, had served in two wars (WWII & Korean) and was on his way to his third (VietNam). Grandpa flew the big birds and really just lucked into learning how to fly. The story goes that he joined the Army in WWII and a buddy of his wanted to go fly for the Army Air Corps. The friend convinced Grandpa to sit in on the exam. As luck would have it, Grandpa passed, his friend did not.
My familial back ground is German, and Grandpa was second generation American . But we still look German. So Grandpa flew for the OSS during WWII. He said he would fly in resistance members behind enemy lines at night. The spies wouldn't have parachutes, so Grandpa would fly low to the ground looking for bonfires. The bonfires were used to mark the locations of large hay bales where the spies were expected to jump out of the plane and land.
To this day, Grandpa says he flew in Mussolini's assassin.
But I digress. Mom and Dad were barely making a living - even with college degrees. Dad pumped gas for Sears and Mom was getting ready to have me. I was actually born a civilian baby, which means that the government didn't pay for my hospital stay, my grandparents did.
I was born in December, 1966 and a month later mom and dad packed up everything they owned into a VW bug and we moved to Phoenix, Arizona. Dad had to go through OTS and then flight school.
I was a 7 pound preemie, or so I thought for 21 years. My folks met at West Texas State University. My mom graduated with an education degree and my dad, barely, with a Sociology degree. They got married May 1, 1966 and graduated a few weeks later. They stayed in Canyon, Texas while waiting for Dad to be accepted into the Air Force.
Dad is an Air Force Brat, too, and has an interesting up bringing. Bumped around. The usual. Mom is Oil Field Trash. She attended four different high schools, and four different colleges. The VietNam war was going on, and Mom absolutely didn't want him to join the Air Force. But all Dad ever wanted to do was to learn how to fly. His own father was still active, had served in two wars (WWII & Korean) and was on his way to his third (VietNam). Grandpa flew the big birds and really just lucked into learning how to fly. The story goes that he joined the Army in WWII and a buddy of his wanted to go fly for the Army Air Corps. The friend convinced Grandpa to sit in on the exam. As luck would have it, Grandpa passed, his friend did not.
My familial back ground is German, and Grandpa was second generation American . But we still look German. So Grandpa flew for the OSS during WWII. He said he would fly in resistance members behind enemy lines at night. The spies wouldn't have parachutes, so Grandpa would fly low to the ground looking for bonfires. The bonfires were used to mark the locations of large hay bales where the spies were expected to jump out of the plane and land.
To this day, Grandpa says he flew in Mussolini's assassin.
But I digress. Mom and Dad were barely making a living - even with college degrees. Dad pumped gas for Sears and Mom was getting ready to have me. I was actually born a civilian baby, which means that the government didn't pay for my hospital stay, my grandparents did.
I was born in December, 1966 and a month later mom and dad packed up everything they owned into a VW bug and we moved to Phoenix, Arizona. Dad had to go through OTS and then flight school.
Thursday, April 19, 2007
Why I started this
I have a number of blogs, but this one is specifically for me to write down my memories of growing up as an Air Force Brat from the early 70's to the end of the 80's. I bumped around quite a bit and my folks live life hard and fast. My memories of this time are fun and I want to document them.
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