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Joe and Carole Smith, 84 and 85 

Carole: The most interesting thing about us is that we met in India. I was born in Silver City, New Mexico, and my dad was in construction, so we moved all over the West. My mother was a homemaker. We were a close-knit family, and all those moves made me able to accept change very well. When I was four, my dad got a job in Cuba and we joined him. It was 1939 to 1943, and a fun and beautiful time in Cuba, back in the days of Batista, before Castro. 

I went to seven different high schools and business school in Fresno, California. Then my dad got a job in India, and we all went with him. We lived there for two years. 

Joe: I was born in Jasper in deep east Texas, and lived there during WWII. But then my dad got hired to build the Mansfield Dam here in Austin, so we lived here for five years. Then dad moved us to Louisiana, which is where I graduated high school, then went to Louisiana State. 

Then my father got the job to build the then highest dam in the world, the Bhakra Dam in India. There were 50 American families living there. I never would have met Carole in the States. 

Carole: Joe courted me on the steps of the Taj Mahal, which is truly beautiful, especially in moonlight. I was teaching kids fourth and fifth grade. 

Joe: I went on a hunting trip and I was surrounded by a bunch of communists who didn’t care about me but wanted my shotgun. The police came and got me out, and Carole and her folks came over to see what had happened. I had never seen her before. In a way it was funny, but also serious. I could have been done away with.  

We had a car and went to various cities, including New Delhi, the Golden Temple, where thousands were massacred. This was right before Ghandi was assassinated, and Nehru was prime minister.  

We were together eight or 10 months, decided to come back to the U.S. and got engaged, then I enlisted into the Air Force. I came back a year later and we got married in Excelsior Springs. I fell for her because she was a very sweet lady and she could cook. She really could. 

Carole: I thought Joe was very good looking and had beautiful hair. We’ve been married 64 years. Our secret is being able to forgive one another when we had a fight or made a mistake. We had the same interests. When we were younger, we mostly went camping and when we had our daughters, they learned how to fish and water ski. 

Joe: I met my Air Force commitment, then started my career. We lived in San Antonio, and I started working for Southwestern Life Insurance, directing recruiting for the company. I loved it because we opened up recruiting in every major university in the U.S., and we got to live in Dallas, New Orleans, Houston. 

Carole: I worked at USAA Insurance until my girls were born, then as soon as they were in high school, I went back to work at the Sheriff’s office. 

Joe: After we retired, we sold our home and bought a big diesel motor home. We travelled all over the country for about 13 years. We’d go somewhere and stay a month, then go somewhere else. We did lots of fishing, and we’ve been to every state.

Carole: The last five or six years we spent in Buena Vista, Colorado, June 1 to October 1, to get out of the Texas heat. Joe trout fished nearly every day. 

Our daughters are both local, and the youngest daughter has two sons, one a firefighter and the other in real estate, and they are here in Austin. The older daughter, unfortunately, has been mentally disabled since age 10, and lives now in a nursing home in Austin. We do regret she can’t share more with us. 

We were crowned Continental Valentine King and Queen here, and Joe is a ragtime piano player. His favorite first cousin, Evie Jo Fredrick lives here, too, and together they started a non-denominational church, and they play and sing a lot. She is one of the reasons we decided to sell the RV and come here. Time to get off the road. We have learned to accept and adapt and be very thankful.

Joe: It takes a while to learn, people are more different than they are alike, so kindness is very important. It’s better to listen more and talk less.  

Carole and Joe live at The Continental in Austin, Texas. Learn more about their independent retirement community here. 

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Larry Boone, 85

I was born and grew up during the Depression, in Raymondville in the deep south of Texas. My dad was a mechanic at a Ford dealership and we were lucky because the farmers whose cars he worked on would give us food, like cabbage, which I cannot eat now. My mother was a good caring woman.

My school years were the typical blue jeans and country music. I worked and got a car, a 1934 Ford coupe that I traded up for a 1935, and drove that all the way through graduation. In college I enrolled in ROTC and went into the Army with a commission. I got stationed in San Francisco, and my friends and I bowled on a team. That’s where I met my wife, Peg (her full name was Margaret Rosalie, which I used only to irritate her occasionally). One night one of our guys was sick, so she took his place. And I used what has to be the most boring pickup line: “Could I buy you a beer?” But it worked. We were married almost 58 years before she passed away. We had three children, two girls and a boy in the middle. Now we have three grandchildren.

While I was in college, I worked at First National Bank part time, then came back and worked there full time until 1970. Then I became bank examiner for the state of Texas and moved to Austin. I did that until 1977. We moved to down the coast to Rockport for another bank, which I became president of, then formed a new bank where I worked until 1987. That’s when I realized banking had changed a great deal. It was hard to watch—how everything changed as banks were acquired by holding companies. It was no fun anymore. Attitudes changed.

I retired—which Peg predicted would last six months—then worked as a substitute teacher, sold real estate, worked in a credit department, then worked with a company that kept track of residential construction. That was a fun job, I got outside and met people, and my territory was wide, even north and west of Austin. I finally retired to play golf.

Peg passed away in 2016. She was a pretty independent young woman; we just loved each other’s company. She was my soulmate. I consider myself a most cantankerous person, not very patient. I wear a golf hat with many pins on it. My son went to Disneyland and brought me a “Grumpy” pin for my hat.

Larry lives at The Clairmont in Austin, Texas. Learn more about his independent retirement community here.

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Jane Markley, 86  

I am going to begin with my father, an interesting man who made a significant impact on my life. As a young man he had various jobs, but made a career as an army officer during and after WWII. He was mostly absent during my childhood, overseas for three years, then absent during my teens due to divorce. Therefore, I gained knowledge of him mostly as an adult. As a child I remember only that he was strict.

What I liked about him as an adult was that he had many interests, and whatever he was into he researched thoroughly whether it was electronics, opera, or learning to make bread and candy.

After retiring, he bought and worked a walnut farm. His multiple interests and curiosity must have somehow contributed to my own diverse interests. On the downside, he was something of a snob and arrogant. However, I learned from my step-mother that he was greatly appreciated by the men who served under him—he was liked, respected and extremely fair.

Another way he influenced me was by divorcing my mother. She was a sweet woman, fun-loving and kind and always had sympathy for those less fortunate. She was capable, well-liked by many friends, and always revered at the places she worked as a salesperson. At the same time, her upbringing had left her very insecure.

The divorce was devastating to her. She never fully recovered. We moved to California to hopefully start a new life. California was my home for my most formative years, junior and senior high school, college, marriage and the birth of my three daughters.

My mother was always there for me, but also looked to me for love and well-being, which was a burden I did not always handle well. Now that I have more experience, I know the understanding and perspective I have now (one of the gifts of aging) could have been helpful to her. The gift my mother gave me was her kindness, which is my highest value.

My first career out of college was teaching. I majored in speech arts, which included theater and English. I got a job teaching high school speech and English, and I absolutely loved it. I loved the students, plus we participated in a lot of speech competitions which included drama events. I was young and very close to my students.

I taught in the San Diego area for seven years, then got married and moved to Palo Alto, because my husband had a fellowship at Stanford. We had a very good marriage for a while, and we had two girls at that time. We then moved to Evanston, Illinois, where he attended Northwestern. I hated living indoors so much, with small children, so after his doctorate we moved back to California, eventually back to Palo Alto, where we had another daughter.

We moved to Houston in 1978, which proved to be a catalyst for our split in 1984. Our lives became very separate. But over the years, we have become friends—no custody or visitation difficulties—and have a very good relationship now.

I taught intermediate school in Texas, which I didn’t love as much as teaching high school, so I went back to school at University of Houston, and became a family therapist. I worked at DePelchin Children’s Center for more than 25 years. I didn’t retire till age 75.

I enjoyed family counseling because it allowed me to get to know people in some depth. It is so satisfying to help people and see them solve problems and improve relationships.

After I retired, I was not interested in keeping up my house and yard, so I moved here to Austin. My youngest daughter lives here and has three boys. My other daughters live in Seattle and Vermont, and I have eight grandchildren. Those are nice places for me to visit, and they also visit me here. My great joy is seeing the cousins enjoy each other—I had no siblings or cousins growing up.

I was devastated by my divorce, but I was determined to not end up like my mother. I think I survived because of my spiritual orientation, that there is something larger than my immediate feelings that I am part of. At the time, I thanked God every day that the sun came up no matter how I was feeling.

In so many ways I feel my life has been blessed—two meaningful careers, three wonderful daughters and their families—and now I have the privilege of living comfortably in this retirement community where I can enjoy good friends and activities, be with people when I want, be alone when I want. And I like having the time to pursue many interests—games, beading and books, plus theater and politics on TV.

Jane lives at The Continental in Austin, Texas. Learn more about her independent retirement community here.

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Jeanette Evans, 80

I was born and raised in Dallas. My brother, John, was five years younger and I took advantage of him, not letting him win any games, because he was Daddy’s favorite and I was jealous. But he was just happy to be playing with me. Daddy sold life insurance and my mother was a public school teacher. He tried to put on a happy face but he hated his work and was very unhappy and negative, and very critical of us. Mom was easygoing and tried to make him happy. We all went to counseling, but he wouldn’t go—she was his counselor. It was a positive experience for me, and helped me later in life.

The counseling helped Mom feel better and gave her strength to continue. She actually went to an attorney once to see about getting a divorce, and the lawyer talked her out of it, saying that she and the kids would starve. Dad got Alzheimer’s in his 70s which was doubly hard on Mom.

I went to Woodrow Wilson Junior High, where I was miserable until I joined the drill team, and then in high school I joined the school paper. I went to Baylor in Waco and also edited the paper there.  Between junior and senior year in high school I met Robert Thomas at a church picnic and he swept me off my feet. He was charming, romantic and confident, and big: 6’4” and 200 pounds. He made me feel safe and couldn’t have been more different from my father. I fell madly in love.

We ran off and got married in 1958. I didn’t think my parents would approve, but when I called my mother to tell her she said, “Come home and we’ll do it officially.” I majored in journalism and lived in her house so I could finish school. Robert went to Dallas to work for his father’s glass company. It was like a honeymoon every weekend. Then we bought a little house in Casa View and soon after we discovered I was pregnant. My boss wanted to fire me, but one of my male co-workers intervened. Ironically, I was a clerk typist in the county divorce court. I vowed to never get a divorce.

Bob and I were married 24 years. We had three children, and when I was 40 I went back to finish my degree. Soon it became clear that our daughter was mentally ill, diagnosed with bipolar disorder. She has been taking lithium on and off since she was 15. She’s been married twice and now has seven children. She lost custody of the children, and she blames me and her brothers for that. I keep trying to have a relationship with her, but she won’t let me. It’s the big sorrow of my life, that I couldn’t help her.

Then Bob took up with a girlfriend! I had to divorce him. And I believe he was bipolar as well. My counselor told me he was a manic depressive and he loves his mania, so doesn’t want to take medication. My first son is a high-functioning alcoholic and my second son has been sober two and a half years. Both are devoted to me. I’m so grateful.

I was working on my degree when I met my second husband, Mac, and he said he remembered seeing me at an AA meeting. I was a binge drinker, and my brother became a recovering alcoholic, and he told me, “Go to a meeting and decide for yourself.” I did, and my counselor said, “If you can drink just one drink a day for 30 days, you are not an alcoholic.” I had to report that I failed, but my counselor set me up with one of her patients who took me to meetings and helped me.

I eventually got my business degree, but realized I wanted to get a counseling degree and Mac supported that. So I worked at a facility for alcohol and drug addicts. We helped them at least have some of the best days of their lives. Mac died in February this year. I sold our house and came to The Clairemont. We were married 33 years. My only real regret is that I couldn’t help Cathy more; she took the divorce very hard, even though I think Bob was mean to her sometimes. Now I play piano and write, and try to be a good friend to people here.

Jeanette lives at The Clairmont in Austin, Texas. Learn more about her independent retirement community here.

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Bradley Byers, 89

I was born in a very small town called Calico Rock, in northern Arkansas near the White River. My father had been working for a lumber company following his service in France and Germany during World War I, but by the start of the Depression my family became farmers. I was one of five children, and food was scarce, so my older sister was sent to live with relatives in Oklahoma.

Eventually my father started working in the East Texas oilfields. We moved around, lived on an oil lease where my sister and I carried water from a spring for drinking. We ended up in Kilgore, about 10 miles from Longview, Texas, where I went to high school. My father oversaw 17 wells in Kilgore, but he was still barely able to provide for his family.

My sister rejoined the family and we had a new younger sister; my brothers were both fighting WWII in the South Pacific. In high school I really wanted to be athletic, but I wasn’t an athlete, so an English teacher talked me into entering a writing contest. When my essay didn’t win, I vowed to study journalism as a senior so I could win. I was a sports addict, so I became the sports editor of the school paper, The Mirror, and decided on journalism as a career.

There was no way my parents could send any of us to college, so I went to junior college in town, where the tuition was $25 a semester. I became sports editor on that paper, The Flare, then editor-in-chief. My sister was working as a secretary, and she wanted her little brother to go to college, so she financed me into University of Texas, Austin. When she got married, I stopped taking money from her and worked at the Daily Texan, then in the press office of the Texas capital. I remember breakfast was a doughnut and coffee, lunch was in the cafeteria, and for supper I ate a candy bar.

When I worked at the press office, I began to eat again. I went to grad school and became the managing editor of the Daily Texan, making $75 a month. But instead of finishing my thesis, I enlisted in the Marine Corps Reserves Officer Candidate Class at Quantico, Virginia. Commissioned as a 2nd lieutenant, I was sent to Camp Pendleton, California, eventually getting assigned to create a searchlight platoon for battlefield illumination, since the Chinese had started fighting at night.

I chose my men and equipment, got promoted to 1st lieutenant and basically was totally on my own. After my release in December 1954, I moved to Freeport, Texas, then back to Austin, where I served as editor of a church newspaper for five years. Then I was hired by Dow Chemical as editor of an internal publication.

Two years later, I got a phone call from Progressive Farmer Magazine in Birmingham, Alabama. They wanted to start a paper for the people who lived in Southern towns, and that’s how I became founding executive editor of Southern Living Magazine. I loved it. We put out our first issue in February 1966 and had lots of different ideas.

At one point a New York City editor persuaded me that the magazine wasn’t going to make it, and tried to get me to come to NYC, but instead I took a job in Washington as the news media chief for the US Academy of Sciences. It was formed under Lincoln to advise the government on all matters of science and technology. I ran press conferences and wrote press releases for the science reporters for all the major newspapers.

Eventually, under President Ford, I became the media liaison for the Energy Research and Development Administration on renewable energy, which was morphed into the Department of Energy under Jimmy Carter. Carter put solar panels on the White House; Reagan took them off when he was elected. And most of us got laid off.

It was difficult, because it was a very prestigious job, running dedications for windmills and such all over the country and overseas. My wife was teaching school and I found work as public affairs officer for an agency of the Department of Energy in Tulsa, Oklahoma, which is the job I retired from.

I met my wife Janet in college, when I walked her younger sister home from a dance, and had to delicately switch from Joyce to Janet. After five years, I finally persuaded Janet to marry me while I was in the Marines. We honeymooned in Yosemite, then I went down to Camp Pendleton. We were married for 40 happy years until Janet’s death from lupus. We have a son, a daughter and seven grandchildren.

My one regret is that I didn’t take that offer to move to NYC and become a magazine editor there.

Bradley lives at The Continental in Austin, Texas. Learn more about his independent retirement community here.

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Jane (84) and Roland (86) Perdue

Jane: My childhood was wonderful. I grew up in a kind of family compound with my siblings and cousins in Asheville, North Carolina. We spent all day playing in the woods and streams. My father was an attorney and my mother was a teacher who then stayed at home with her three children. My father was an outgoing, gregarious man—very affirming. If you told him you set a house on fire, he would say, “Oh, what a lovely fire you made.” Turns out he had a lifelong struggle with alcohol, and my mother, who was very introverted, took care of him as she had taken care of her own mother through breast cancer. She was a wonderful cook—it was her creative outlet.

I attended a Catholic school and that helped me understand religions and solidify my own beliefs. After high school, I went to Greensboro College, then University of North Carolina, where I met my husband, Roland.

Roland tells me that when we met, one of my first questions was “Do you like books?” I liked that he was on an athletic scholarship, and was captain of the football team, but has such an intellectual side. I liked his tender soft side. He was very well-rounded and a good listener. It’s what made him a very good pastor one day.

Roland: Jane was beautiful and she was sweet. She was the most giving person, with the fewest wants of anyone I’ve ever known. When we first moved to The Clairemont, we talked about how happy we were here, and I said, “Jane, you’d be happy in a homeless shelter.” She is the best wife anyone could hope for. I really do love her and always will.

We’ve been married for 62 years. The secret? Keeping your sense of humor and having an appreciation for each other’s individuality. I grew up living in San Diego and Bellflower and Hollywood. In spite of the fact we’ve been in the south for so long, I still think of myself as a Westerner.

Jane: We had five children in the span of eight years. Most of them live near us in Texas; one son is in Carlsbad, California. I just love the process of birthing a child, then watching them become a completely different person with a different personality and many shared traits out of the shared gene pool. I love the idea of letting them be who they are and finding their own way. It’s life challenges that keep you alive and awake. And of course the love; you love them and they love you back.

It’s also why I love teaching, which I did in many places, in churches and substitute teaching in church school. I especially loved the inner-city Catholic school in Detroit where I taught. It was a very difficult situation. I liked watching them develop into the adults they were going to be.

We lived in Detroit during the riots. Our school tried to offer a mission to children who were growing up in a terrible situation. It cost a dollar a month. And at one point, I despaired and felt that no matter what I was doing, all of the children would end up in prison. Roland talked me into staying, and by the next year I just loved it. I realized that education was the only thing that could save these kids, and their parents had a victory every day just getting them to school.

Roland did keep us moving around as a pastor, but we never felt like strangers because of the church. I agree with Roland; one of the best things is to have a sense of humor, to enjoy the highs and lows of life. The most difficult is seeing your children suffer and not be able to do anything about it. I live with a sense of gratitude. And I write poetry.

Jane and Roland live at The Clairmont in Austin, Texas. Learn more about their independent retirement community here.

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Bob Baines, 95

My childhood was about like every other kid then. This was the Depression, nobody had any money, so nobody did anything. I grew up in Shreveport, Louisiana. My father was an electrical contractor, and during the Depression he started his own business, which was a successful one. He first worked wiring downtown businesses, then building houses.

My mother was a secretary who worked for a pharmaceutical company. I went to high school and college in Shreveport, then enlisted in the Signal Corps. I was stationed in northern France during WWII, including during the Normandy landing. I was responsible for long-distance communications and installed the high-powered stateside lines. 

I met my wife Helen in college, waiting to get into the dining room for lunch. We liked the same things.

Most people don’t understand, but almost everything I worked on then and at NASA, was classified. You can’t tell anyone anything, then eventually you forget yourself.

For the Apollo program, I worked on the capsule communications so the astronauts could talk to Earth. I remember sitting in the console room during the landing and hearing the famous words, “That’s one small step for man ….” We all knew we were doing big things that no one had done before, and we all had the feeling it would go down in history. But also, it was all in a day’s work. It has only been in the last year that I could even tell anyone I worked in the program. It was quite classified.

Helen and I had a daughter, Susan, who worked for the state of Texas, and is now retired. We used to live in Southern California, on the peninsula where Rancho Palos Verdes is. The view was 50 miles north and south across to Catalina, and inland to downtown LA. That’s when I worked in aerospace for TRW. My whole life’s work has been research.

I also am a ham radio operator and talk to friends all over the country.

Bob lives at The Continental in Austin, Texas. Learn more about his independent retirement community here.

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Dana Goodale, 86

I grew up in Memphis, and moved with my family to Houston at 12. My dad went ahead of us and he said everybody wore cowboy clothes (it was Rodeo Day), so I thought, “Oh boy, I’m gonna be a cowgirl.” Well, I never got a horse, but I did like Texas very much, I never met a stranger in Texas.

I was married and had two children by the time I was 21. My husband wouldn’t let me finish college, or work, and by the time I was 38, I realized the marriage wasn’t going to be what I hoped. I had wonderful parents but they were naïve and they tended to my life. So when I met my ex, he had a car and a job, and it looked like freedom.

When I had my children, their pediatrician was a tall, stately woman whose nose looked flattened, like something happened to it. And when her parents asked if she wanted to do something about it, she said “No, I like it.” She guided me as a mother, and taught me how to roll with the punches.

When I was 56, I really wanted to go to Africa. I had been divorced for years, my children were grown and doing well, both my parents gone, too. I had no responsibilities. 

But I knew I couldn’t afford to go on my own, so I called the Peace Corps! They said they didn’t have a place in Africa secure enough to send someone of my age. But they said there were other places. So, I filled out the paperwork and went to Dallas for an interview, and they realized I really was serious. I was sent to Guatemala. The day I flew out, my son took me to the airport at 5 a.m., and I thought, “This is the first day of the rest of my life.”

We had a training in country — a small town between Guatemala City and Antigua — for three months and I learned Spanish and the work we would be doing. Some groups planted trees, some would be in the fish group. Everyone had different skills, and all were younger than me, which was fun. I worked with three other women in different locations, and we would walk to town and teach the girls games and songs, how to crochet and cook. We laughed a lot, and by the time I went to my site, I was fluent in Spanish. I loved it.

The program lasted for two years, and I really learned much more than I taught. I learned how much our country does for us and how we often take it for granted. They asked me to stay another year, but my children were starting to have babies and things, so it was time.

I didn’t know it when I went to the Peace Corps, but I realized I am a teacher. When I got home, I went back to school to get a degree and started teaching. First at Job Corps, then at a junior high and high school. I also built a house! All brick with a wraparound porch, in Wimberley, Texas. By that time I was 66, still working full time, and the house was in a senior community. The problem was, when I got home from work, everyone was in for the night, so I didn’t meet many people. I was having back problems at the time, and my daughter insisted I move back to Houston, where she could look after me. But two years later she met and married her current husband and moved away, so I was in Houston in a facility I could see needed repairs. My son in Austin suggested I come and see some places and be closer to him. I walked into the Clairmont and said, “This feels like home.” It was wonderful.

I have always had lots of friends and even after the divorce I dated and went places. I loved my children and loved being a mother, but if I had it to do all over again, I would have become a college professor. What I have learned from my life is to listen and love other people, no matter what their problems are. Be compassionate.  

Dana lives at The Clairmont in Austin, Texas. Learn more about her independent retirement community here.

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Frances Tomlinson, 95

As a child, I had total security and total freedom. I was the third of three—my sister was 13 years older and my brother seven years older—so I was raised like an only child. I had a dog that was my pal but nobody else paid any attention to me, or knew where we went from morning to night. I sometimes wondered why no one was concerned when we were gone all day. 

I grew up in Taylor County, south of Abilene, and my parents were ranchers. We had all the vegetables, beef, pork and chicken we wanted, and my mother was a wonderful cook. She made all my clothes and also was a natural piano player who could play anything by ear, a talent that skipped me and went to my daughter and grandson.  

I went to a rural high school that was great. I was a cheerleader, a class officer, on the debate team and the interscholastic league declaration team. I loved speech and that’s how I got to college. I went to Hardin-Simmons University in Abilene. My speech teacher, Miss Head, was my favorite. I went out almost every night, and was dating the man I finally married. He was a football player. I liked everything about him. He was 6’6” and I was 5’1”, so we were like Mutt and Jeff. He was such a caring person, raised by his grandmother. I had the pleasure of his company for 50 years, and I just can’t imagine another relationship. 

Guy was at officer’s candidate school in Amarillo with the Marine Corps. We got married and had 18 days together, then he shipped out to the South Pacific. The Marines were an elite group then, discipline and dedication. It was special. And I was very independent and had a career, so while we had to make some adjustments, everything worked out just fine. His mother never took to me, though. She would say, “You took my son away from me.”  

But I swear the reason our marriage worked so well is that we both were independent, and he encouraged that. I got my real estate license when that wasn’t a popular job for women. When I did PR for Bank of the Southwest, the bank president realized women who have been widowed needed to learn about how to save and invest their inheritance, and I knew just how to teach them that.  

We had two daughters, six years apart, and I worked but I was always there for them, while also allowing them to develop independence. 

Guy and I played golf, and I won a lot of trophies. Golf led us all over the country, playing the best courses. He was an engineer for a natural gas company, and it took him away from home, but as I said, I developed independence early in life. We had telephone and radio, so we stayed in touch. And it was exciting. Every foot was an adventure when you were looking for gas. He loved it, too.  

I was born a happy, positive person, and even at 96, I don’t like to sit next to someone who grumbles. I play games every night, and I’m in excellent health, with no artificial parts. I’m from a line of long livers—my sister died at 99, my mother at 96. My get-along is just fine, as long as I have my cane. 

Frances lives at The Continental in Austin, Texas. Learn more about her independent retirement community here. 

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Daniel Maeso, 83

I had a beautiful young life in Puerto Rico. My father died when I was 7, but my mom married a great man when I was 13. I was an only child until I was 12, and had a great education in P.R., then my folks sent me to the United States for college. After college, I enlisted and was stationed in Okinawa. I got an honorable discharge and enrolled in medical school in Spain. I didn’t like med school, so I came back to the States and went to law school. I became a federal prosecutor in Houston, then moved to Austin.

Just before law school I was working as an insurance adjustor, and I met my wife on one of the jobs. She was very friendly and articulate, and I really liked her. Maria and I were married 22 years, have two daughters who live in Austin, and three grandchildren.  

I loved my job, but there is a saying among prosecutors: “Convicting the guilty is great, but it’s very difficult when you know you are convicting an innocent person.” I always did my research before prosecuting, but it takes experience, and sometimes you have to deal with crooked attorneys.

I loved doing a justice for the victims. I became an attorney because my mother, who was a court reporter in New York, brought me with her to court. One of my proudest achievments is a big flag I received from the Justice Department while Nixon was president. In fact, “Tricky Dick” visited the Texas State Justice Department with his entourage and I got to meet him. He had just come back from China and made that historical connection with the Communists and we just thought he was a great president. Then came Watergate.  

Daniel lives at The Clairmont in Austin, Texas. Learn more about his independent retirement community here.

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Evie Jo Frederick, 86

My cousin Joe Smith and I started our lives together. We are the same age and grew up in the small East Texas town of Newton. When WWII started, we moved to Beaumont, where my father worked in the shipyards as a welder. He was also an elected official, and a wonderful, personable man. My father and mother were a well-respected couple who honored God. My mother was a historian with such teaching abilities, everyone wanted to be in her classes.  

I had two older brothers and a younger sister, and we all were raised with very strong Christian faith. My brother was a concert pianist, and so was my cousin Joe—and I love to sing. So we have drawn people in—we sit at the piano and sing patriotic songs, and sometimes have 40 or 50 people singing together. 

In high school I got top awards for academics and won a four-year college scholarship, voted most likely to succeed. I had a wonderful time. I got two masters, in physical education (because I’m an athlete) and speech (to move into school administration). I went to La Marr University, which is where I met my husband, Bob Frederick, who was an all-American football player. We got to know each other and he took me to a really fancy Thanksgiving dance at the Hotel Beaumont. I wore a blue taffeta dress. He was 6”4’ and very much a macho man, but kind and well-mannered. He went with me to church every Sunday; we taught the youth. I liked him for that. 

He just got out of the Navy, and his coach was hired at La Marr, and brought him with him. Then he was head football coach at Port Arthur, where he stayed for 15 years. 

I had three babies about three years apart, and when the third child was in kindergarten, I started teaching school, and coaching tennis and volleyball. Eventually I became an assistant principal, hired for crisis counseling. Then I was hired at Lake Travis (“God’s country”) as assistant principal. My family was all so well-suited to each other. They were athletic and didn’t mind getting up early. They loved sports. Bob and I played tennis together. They didn’t do much for girls in sports then, so we played a lot. He died at 72, just after we had fished the Amazon River, from a pulmonary embolism. 

I’m proud to have started a Sunday night ministry that now has hundreds of women coming for counseling, and they are giving me an award from them. I also teach Bible class, and Joe and I have started a church here. I have no regrets, not a one. 

Evie Jo lives at The Continental in Austin, Texas. Learn more about her independent retirement community here.

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Joanne Comer, 91

My father was a banker until the Depression hit. We lived in Kansas City, Missouri, and he tried to save a savings and loan that went down the tubes. After that he sold insurance. He was my hero. He taught me to always look for the good in people. My mother was very sick, and had bouts of being bedridden. But she was active in church and took care of her family, including the extended family of cousins. She was refined, a real lady, and was dearly loved.

I remember my grandmother telling stories about being a teenager during the Civil War, and cousins telling us about riding in a covered wagon from Missouri to New Mexico at the turn of the 20th century. 

My childhood was idyllic; I could wander anywhere and no one ever worried. I was a good student and athlete, and never had to worry about being chosen for a team. I played about 10 different sports and was one of two girls to get a letter, because they ran out of stars, in my senior year. 

I went to William Jewell College in Missouri for two years, then to Kansas University. I was advised to experience a small and a big school. I majored in sociology, and then got to go on an archeological dig in an Indian village in South Dakota.

I met my husband, Ralph at KU. He had just come back from WWII, but at first I didn’t pay much attention to him. I thought he had a girlfriend back in Kansas City. But around Christmas I asked him to a party, and discovered he didn’t. I saw how he treated my roommate—like a princess—and he kept hanging around. He was brilliant but didn’t flaunt it. Two years later we got married. 

Ralph ended up with five degrees, and finally became a doctor. He was kind, and understood my moods. We had four kids, and when they were grown, I sat in on a rehab session for substance abusers, and I decided to get my masters in psychology and counseling. Ralph was a good doctor, and worked in family practice, then preventive medicine. Then when our friend went into rehab, Ralph ended up working with the Navy in rehab. We practiced together for a time. 

We lived in the jungles of Panama, where Ralph worked on wiping out malaria. He hoped to find a pill that would be effective in Vietnam, because quinine wasn’t working anymore. 

Because we moved every year or so, our children learned to be flexible and open to new experiences. We loved retirement, and played volleyball and bridge. We enjoyed bowling, reading and carving. I have continued to be active, played volleyball and bowled in the Senior Games, even won a championship medal one year in Florida.  

And I’m proud to have eight great-grandchildren, including a great-grandson who was named storyteller of his class. I have learned to groove on life, to be open to differences, to drink it all in. 

Joanne lives at The Clairmont in Austin, Texas. Learn more about her independent retirement community here. 

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Joan (80) and Gailan (72) Nichols

Joan: Gailan had a very different upbringing from mine. In contrast to Gailan’s locomotive past, mine was unvarying. I was an only child, and literally lived in about a 20-mile radius my whole life. My father was an accountant, my mother a housewife. I lived in Portland for 25 years, taking piano and dance lessons, singing in the choir and going to camp with Campfire Girls. I played softball and they won the Portland Championship one year. I got married, moved 12 miles away to Lake Oswego, where I lived for the next 52 years. Raised one son and two daughters, then worked as an auditor, and helped oversee the original construction of Summerfield Estates in Tigard, Oregon. Little did I know that I would be living there in about 35 years … a move of about six miles.

Gailan: I was a Navy brat, and we moved around all over the country. I went to a different school every year until high school. I remember being in Hawaii when I was three, a pool with a net around it to keep the sharks out, and my mother taking hula lessons. I ended up in Port Hueneme, Calif., for high school, and my father made a conscious decision to stay there all four years. I missed the opportunity to make lifelong friends, but also appreciated the opportunities to travel and how I got to know people quickly. I was also an only child, adopted at nine months old.

I also got married early on, but we had no children. Joan and I have been married almost 30 years. I worked in healthcare administration and as a lobbyist, and I first met Joan when she was financial controller of a healthcare association. I was in town and needed someone to bring to a project and an air show in Portland, and thought of her. I called, she remembered me and we went to the event. We had a nice time—steak, lobster, nice people—so I asked her out again.  

I liked her wit, and that she was crazy—and I say that with great affection. And that was it for me. She was highly professional and we worked together on some complicated projects, and had lots of laughs and tears.

Joan: My first impression was that Gailan was very good looking and very tall. He’s over 6 feet and I’m 4’11.” I knew we clicked in a business way, but it didn’t make sense romantically. He was 8 years younger. But he was persistent and after about a year we were engaged, then married a year after that. My children liked him.

I retired after 40 years of working and raising kids. I was burned out. I got involved with PEO women’s organization, which raises funds for scholarships and operates Cottee College in Missouri. My son bought an old mansion in Missouri and rebuilt it, which has been a joy for me to see. One of my daughters lives in Granada Hills, Calif., and owns a photography business, the other is a massage therapist in Beaverton, Ore.

Now we keep busy traveling and going to concerts and theater, and driving to Missouri. I take Tai Chi. We both are quite comfortable in our skin, and can easily entertain ourselves.  

Gailan:  We try to see all parts of the country.

One of the happiest moments of my life was when the plane bringing me home from Vietnam touched down in Seattle and the 300 men onboard roared. I’ll never forget it. It was just as Mr. Roberts put it: “Days and weeks of tedium and boredom broken up by sheer terror.” I was a medic and I had days that were nothing but blue skies, and days of carnage I can’t even talk about without crying. And you never knew if you were going to live the next hour, let alone the next day. I remember that the Vietnam War was so unpopular that we were told not to wear our uniforms back home. The men just did what they were supposed to be doing; there was no reason not to be thankful to them.

Joan: I found retirement one of the most difficult times in my life. It’s strange, after working in health care for 50 years, to know that when I wake up in the morning, nobody needs me. Children and grandchildren have been the joy of my life.

Gailan: I have learned patience and sometimes I wish I could be 25 or 30 again, and know what I know now. Sometimes I wish I had more time.

Joan: I’ve learned to accept people for who they are. I didn’t start out that way; I had a narrow view of people. You learn to soften.

Joan and Gailan live at Summerfield Estates in Tigard, Oregon. Learn more about their independent retirement community here.

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Judy Doty, 72

In school I would get into a lot of trouble, mostly because I was bored. Every report card had an A grade [in academics] and an F in conduct. I would always finish the books the first day, then have nothing to do. I was a very smart kid, but I’d get the whole class going, like the class clown. They called my parents the first week, then never again.  

This was in Hillsdale, Ill., near Chicago. My father worked the engine on trains, my mother stayed at home, then worked in electronics. After 8th grade I went to this huge high school for the first three years, then went with my sister in Washington state where there were 88 kids in my class, and I didn’t get into trouble anymore. That was after my parents died within two years of each other. He had a heart attack and she died of a stroke.  

I wish I could have stayed in Illinois; I had a huge scholarship at University of Illinois, but my mother had set up a trust for my schooling, so I went to University of Washington, Seattle. I wanted to become someone who helped people, so I had two majors, sociology and economics.

After college I became a CPA because I didn’t have to go back to school, and I got married. My first husband and I had three children, one of my sons lives in Japan where he and his wife are doctors. I have a daughter in New Jersey who is getting a PhD, and my other son works for the College Board.  

I met my second husband, Ben, at my kids’ high school. I liked him because he was good with the kids and he worked. We also liked camping and doing things with the kids, like looking at rocks and playing practical jokes on each other. We really had a good time raising our kids.

Then when I was 64, I had a huge stroke, and it has affected my ability to form numbers in my head. I have to concentrate on the numbers, then count and spell them out. My dog saved my life. She found me and put her toys all around me and cleaned out my mouth. I was on the floor in the bathroom all day, until my husband came home and found me. At the time, he had cancer, which he passed away from.

I had to re-learn how to dress and take care of myself, and I did physical therapy for a long time. I’m still getting things back. My kids helped a lot.

I went to one assisted living place, now I’m here at Summerfield. I like it. It’s close enough to the kids who are here, and I like the hallway system. I like to walk. I play a lot of cards, Pinochle and Bridge. I do wish I had traveled outside of the United States more. I was saving for that, then I had my stroke and Ben passed.

I don’t pull pranks like I used to, although when I was in the rehab facility I once took all the silverware rolls apart and re-rolled them so they had three forks or three knives … but that was my last one.  Everyone laughed, and I like to make people laugh. No, I don’t have a boyfriend because I need someone who can take care of me, not the other way around!

Judy lives at Summerfield Estates in Tigard, Oregon. Learn more about her independent retirement community here.

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Richard Banta, 79

I declared myself emancipated when I was 14 years old. I was one of nine children, growing up in Mancotta, Minnesota. My siblings and I did fun things—ice skating and playing in the snow, swimming in the summer, and we became Vikings fans when the team moved to Minnesota.

But my mother died when we were very young. Our father put me and some of my brothers and sisters in an orphanage, and I wanted to get away on my own. I still went to high school, thanks to some people who encouraged me. In high school I ran track, and was on the wrestling and football teams. I graduated, got married and had three kids, two sons and a daughter, who all live close by.

I met my wife in high school. Then I got drafted and went to Vietnam. I think I made it through and came back all right because of my family back home, although I was kind of crazy and spent some time in the stockade.

But when I came home, my whole life changed. When I first went to Nam, I was a pretty negative guy, but I got positive when I got back. My whole philosophy changed. You see so much when you go to war, it makes you appreciate life.

I became a truck driver, and my first marriage lasted five years. My second lasted 30 years, mostly because I was gone most of the time. She passed away. A few years ago, I developed blood poisoning, and I just had a leg amputation; I have a prosthetic leg and use a wheelchair.  

My brothers and sisters and I had a big reunion when I was 22. They are scattered all over the country but we stay in touch. I look back and I think everything worked out for a reason. And it’s all right now; I see my kids and have grandchildren. It’s quite a change, but it’s all right.  

Richard lives at Summerfield Estates in Tigard, Oregon. Learn more about his independent retirement community here.

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Mary Ellen Carver, 87

When I was born, my parents had picked Patricia as my name, but the doctor who delivered me had already decided that I would be named Mary Ellen. I was an only child, born and raised in Yakima Valley—Sunnyside, Washington. My father was a farmer. We didn’t have any money or anything, but we had a horse, a cow and a dog, and grew asparagus, grapes, peaches and cherries. My mother was a housewife and was trained as a beautician although she didn’t work outside the home until I was 9. She cut everyone’s hair.  

As a kid, I was very shy and quiet, but I got good grades. I graduated from high school, then moved to Portland for business college and went to work for a few years. I met my husband, Harvey, on a blind date. We got married a month later. Maybe not the smartest thing to do, but it worked out. He was very smart and we just clicked. We were married for 57 years. Harvey died five years ago.

We had three sons—the oldest died 22 years ago, the middle son is in Florida, the youngest is in Beaverton, Oregon. I have two grandchildren. I loved being a mother, taking the kids to the park and the library and playing in the yard. Disneyland was the best. I would say my most difficult time was when my parents were ill. I had to keep going to Vancouver where they lived, while trying to take care of my own family, too. Finally, we moved my mom to live with us.

I love living here at Summerfield. I volunteer a lot, and since I was an only child, I’m used to being alone, and I don’t get bored or depressed. I have learned how to make the best of things.

Mary Ellen lives at Summerfield Estates in Tigard, Oregon. Learn more about her independent retirement community here.

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Joyful (77) and Remco (76) Waszink

Remco: Joyful and I met at a dance at Cal Poly, San Luis Obispo. We’ve been married nearly 53 years now. The theme of the dance was Heaven and Hell. Joyful flew in from her school, Mt. SAC, and her sister dragged her to the dance. We spotted each other in Hell, but we didn’t meet there. Separately we decided we’d had enough of the fast, loud music of hell, and climbed the stairs to heaven, where there was quiet, slow music. I asked Joyful to dance. We hit it off so well, we literally never stopped.”

Joyful: I like to say that ours was a marriage made in heaven, but we had to go through hell to find each other. I grew up in western Massachusetts, then went to Mt. SAC in Walnut, California to study nursing. I became a nurse, but I also was a very creative person, and I wanted to do something more exciting. So I left nursing first to raise my daughter and son, then I started a wedding business, designing floral arrangements and cakes.

Remco: I was born in the Netherlands, near Amsterdam, then we moved to Bloomingdale (“Valley of flowers”), and eventually my parents and brother went to Los Angeles, and settled in the Pomona area. We moved to the States for the opportunities my father had here, and to get my mother out of the dark and damp climate, that didn’t do her rheumatoid arthritis any good. My degrees brought me to nuclear science, and I worked for Westinghouse for 38 years.

Joyful: I fell in love with him because he was so soft-spoken. And my ancestors are from the Netherlands. It was just easy, like it was meant to be.

Remco: She stood out—literally. She was tall and looked nice. I asked her to dance and it felt like we’d known each other for a long time. We had so many things to talk about. But when I asked her for a date, she said she was engaged to someone else. That fell through, though, and she—against her sister’s wishes—used a pay phone to track me down. Our first date was at the Ontario Airport.

We got married in 1966, moved to Long Beach, Calif., then to Pittsburgh, Pa., for my job with Westinghouse, and finally to Tampa, Fla., near Cape Canaveral. We bought a house in St. Petersburg, and lived there 12 years. We were there during a 100-year flood and we saw one idiot waterskiing down the boulevard. Next, we moved to Pensacola, and we lived there for 18 years. I designed a house to accommodate the wedding business, which the whole family helped with. A Westinghouse plant shut down and I got transferred to Hawaii for a while, then we went back to Pittsburgh, until we couldn’t take the snow and ice anymore.

Joyful: That’s when we moved here, to Summerfield Estates, near my sister. Yes, that sister.  I’m now doing stand-up comedy, which I’ve wanted to do my entire life. My name used to be Lois, a family name, but I understood it to have some negative connotations. Lois means “war” and my mother once told me, “You’ll always be fighting to not be poor.” But it couldn’t be further from who I am. At church people were constantly asking, “Where’s that joyful girl?” It was my nickname, and then I legally changed it. The judge who presided got such a kick out of it she sends me a card every year.

I also always wanted to be a writer—I have written 2,000 poems—but my mother wanted me to be a nurse. One day she gathered everything I had written and set it on fire. So I became a nurse—for a while.

Remco: My parents were quite possessive, and when we called to tell them that Joyful was pregnant, my dad told us that wasn’t in their plans, and my mother said it wasn’t meant to be. They always gave Joyful a hard time when I wasn’t around. My father, especially. I think the war messed them up.  

Joyful: Remco has become my sidekick, and he’s super supportive. We stick together through everything. During the month of December, Remco becomes “Triumphant” so we can be “Joyful and Triumphant…”

Joyful and Remco live at Summerfield Estates in Tigard, Oregon. Learn more about their independent retirement community here.

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