Be aware, the "Message Forum" is NOT password protected.  Unlike profiles that are password protected, anybody who gets to this webpage can see what is written here.  Nobody can contact you directly based on this forum unless you reveal your personal contact information.  Use the "Message Center" for sharing personal contact information with another classmate.

This message forum is an ongoing discussion about anything and just about everything ... within reason.  One thing our class was good at was having opinions.  Almost 70 years of life experience certainly qualifies us as experts on most everything!   Ask a question ... give an opinion ... share some insights ... it's our web site, it's our forum.  That said, it's probably not a good idea to get into arguments about politics, religion, and the like.  While we're experts on everything, we also have a wide range of values and beliefs. This site belongs to all of us ... the whole range ... and we are not here to isolate, alienate, or subjugate anybody.  Of course insults, humiliation, sophomoric barraggadocio, and demented humor is expected behavior among some of us less mature people.
 

Terri Levenhagen (Hoornstra)

Jeanne, I laughed a lot and shared your "Novel Sound of Music" video! As to church, I had to find a new church when we moved here almost 3 years ago, Of course I missed my old congregation of almost 20 years - so the past 2 Sundays I've been "going" to my old church online. The pastor does the whole service from her office, complete with music we can "sing along" with. The most fun was that we do a virtual coffee hour afterwards on Zoom, and I was able to catch up with many of my old friends. My 6th grade tutoring student had just introduced me to Zoom 2 days earlier. I know: who is the the tutor and who is the student? I teach them English, they teach me technology. Jon is still on the ventilator, and was supposed to be transferred to a rehab facility where they would wean him off the vent. But just now the Dr. called and he's had to go back to ICU because of decline in respiratory function. I am concerned on two levels: 1) the breathing and 2) the COVID patients are there! So we hang in there, taking things day by day.

Jim Cejka

"Caveat Emptor"

Everybody wants in on the latest fashion - face masks - right?

I saw an ad today (on Amazon) for a box of basic, medical type face masks - "Used, like new. . . ."

Hmmmmm

Garry Sellers

The witticisms on the homepage are offered in the spirit of fun during this incredibly stressful period.    What scares me is that we could have an old friend and/or classmate in trouble with the virus. It's hard to balance between having a laugh when we most need one and with caring.

Jim Cejka

Right on Garry - 

"Too often we underestimate the power of a touch, a smile, a kind word, a listening ear, and honest compliment, or the smallest act of caring, all of which have the potential to turn a life around."                      Leo Buscaglia

I believe many of us have found that touch, those kind words, and those acts of caring on this site Garry. Thanks for making it possible.

Jeanne Zinser (Gottschalk)

Jim, I echo your words. But oh, I desperately long for a real hug.

Jim Cejka

At least one place (Leon County, FL) has the right idea - 

Lauren Dieterich

Jeanne, regarding your post, yeaterday of giving a real hug. In 2 weeks from today, it will be a year since I got the phone call from my oldest daughter informing me of my son's death. I'd give anything to be able to give him one last hug. 

William Nelson

Jim, we saw a similar post from one of our grand-nephews in Idaho. He and his sibs have raised and shown llamas in their 4-H activities. He posted to "Keep a llama distance apart." Your poster would work for Louisiana, too. 

The restrictions on movement shouldn't bother us too much, because we're basically stay at home folks anyway, but just the fact that now we must stay at home, doesn't make it as much fun. The Texas governor said that anyone entering Texas from Louisiana will be quarantined for two weeks. Our two youngest live in Katy, TX, so we attended our 4-year-old grandson's birthday party yesterday by FaceTime. We've had some health issues, so get out every couple of days to drive to a nearby clinic. We don't have garbage pickup in our rural area, so also have to make runs to the dumpster site every couple of days, but there's not much between here and there. Restaurants are allowed to serve carryouts only. We've done that twice now, to celebrate our 49th anniversary and my birthday. We tried online grocery shopping at Walmart, but then discovered we'd have to drive to a bigger town about 20-miles away to pick it up. There were several out of stock items on our list, too. The sheriff began a program last week for folks over 60; they'll make the pickups for us for free and drop them off at our homes. We might try that when we need to restock.

Our biggest worry is about Mary's sibs in Wisconsin. They're all older and three of the four have serious health problems. We've discussed what we'd do if one of them dies, but now realize we probably won't be able to attend a funeral if the worst happens. We normally make a three-week trip to see our family up there sometime between late May and early September. One of our granddaughters is getting married in mid-October, so we'll make the annual trek around that time. We weren't all that happy about the date until this virus took over the country. Now, it appears she was prescient in picking the date. Hopefully, things will be opening up by then.

We hope each and every one of you and your family stays happy and healthy. Wash your hands and stay close to home.

Jim Cejka

Bill - My son and his wife are in the Coast Guard in Miami, he's regular, she's reserve. Last month, when this isolation and stuff got rolling, and with rumors about call-ups and their duties rampant, they decided to bring their two girls and two dogs up to SC to stay with us. The logic being that we're much more isolated here and have better medical facilities. Anyway, the rumors only half panned out, he has to 'maintain a proximity' around the base (100 miles, should something hit the fan) and she did get called up but spent the time mostly at home waiting for the phone to ring (she's a hazmat/disaster specialist). The duty crisis, for them, was less intense than first thought, so it was decided to return the kids and dogs yesterday.

Never thought that returning grandkids and seeing my family would make me feel so 'illegal,' like a bootlegger or smuggler. There are now checkpoints at the FL border, checking everyone entering. My son had to get special permission from his CO ot leave his limit area (but not leave FL) and come to meet us. So, we ended up meeting them at the border (actually, my son cheated and we met a mile into GA), meeting at a gas station and swapping kids and dogs and stuff from one car to another. Seeing so many people wearing masks added to the atmosphere. They were stopped when they reentered FL but got through OK. 

The rest of the population is now discovering the world of the nerds (and it ain't too bad, really).

Jim Cejka

And here's another link on how to cope, by people who had a reason to - 

https://www.smithsonianmag.com/innovation/ten-tips-scientists-who-have-spent-months-isolation-180974547/?utm_source=smithsoniandaily&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=20200401-daily-responsive&spMailingID=42163524&spUserID=NzY3MzIwNTMzMTYS1&spJobID=1740124351&spReportId=MTc0MDEyNDM1MQS2

William Nelson

Jim,

There was a problem with the link, but I was able to open it after removing the last couple of sections of the address.

We won't run out of things to do for a long, long time. My ToDo list keeps growing. As we age and slow down, "The hurrier we go, the behinder we get." We've got projects to do around the house and outbuildings, and plenty of smaller projects, as well. I'm nearing the end of building a new workbench. I strained my back, twice, while working on it, so far. Bench tops, vises, etc. are all pretty heavy. That's how we wound up in PT, but the therapist says I can now do what I want and he'll check and probably release me a week from Wednesday.

The bench project has been going on for several months, because it keeps getting interrupted by other, smaller projects. I make jigsaw puzzles for the grandkids and great-grandkids and their birthdays seem to have come pretty close together for the past couple of months. I enjoy doing it, even when my back was at its worst, I can manage to cut out and finish them without much strain.

We've had so much rain (1¾" yesterday) that I haven't been able to mow the yard, and it's nearly an acre. I use a walk-behind mower, because a rider would simply sink. There are areas that won't support the walk-behind right now. It provides good exercise when I'm able to use it.

Mary has plenty of stuff to keep her busy, too, The most important is staying in touch with her brother and three sisters. They're all on their own with various stages of health issues. Only her brother has any way to get out on his own. Her eldest sister loves to walk, but doesn't drive. She's experiencing some impediments to taking her daily hikes around Watertown. She's the healthiest of the four. All live in some sort of senior residence and the other two sisters do have some health workers who check on them a couple of times a day. We keep hoping they all survive through the worst of the crisis so we can go and visit them again. It's really strange feeling that we can't visit any of them or our extended family even if we want to. For now, they all stay in touch by phone  on almost a daily basis. It does them all good. We're thankful we don't have any life-threatening issues and look forward to tomorrow as we complete each day.

Thanks to all of you for staying in touch through this venue and thanks to Garry for making it possible.

Nancy Davison (Boerger)

What's everybody doing, you ask? Coloring Easter eggs? Nope. Baking hot cross buns? Nope. Eating chocolate bunnies? Nope.This year I'm sewing face masks for the kids. Made a batch two weeks ago; another batch today, with a better pattern. This video was made by a nurse, so that seemed like a good bet:  

                          https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zm_NmpdgWWA

Hoping not to be starting a new holiday tradition. Be safe everyone. 

Sandy Wachs (Oldham)

Happy Easter everyone.  We can't meet in person, but we can stay conncected through our web site.  Thank you Garry for the great penguin picture!  Enjoy reading all your comments.

Everyone stay safe, and remeber to appreicate all that we do have.

Lauren Dieterich

Easter Sunday is my oldest daughter's birthday. But, there will not be any celebrating outside of wishing her a Happy Birthday. First, she's a Corpsman at Camp Pendleton. Even though most of the Base is on stand down, the Corpsmen are not. Also, being a Chief means more work for her, too.                                                                  Six days after Easter, will be a year since my son died; so, no celebrating. I have a copy of the Coroner's which states cause of death as accidental drowning. There is a 10 second video of his going into the river. His co-worker who took the video didn't know what he had until looking at it. My son very obviously jumped. I saw the video at my son's Celebration of Life. My daughter visited me 6 weeks ago; and, when my son's death came up , she told me that she, her sisters and my Ex had discussed this. I told her that my youngest brother and I had also talked about it. We all agree that it was what I've heard called a 'spur of the monemt suicide'  He was in good health and making good money; so, who knows.

William Nelson

Lauren,

We really feel for you on the loss of your son. A couple of years ago, while we were in Wisconsin visiting our friends and relatives on our annual trip,  we'd visited our eldest granddaughter and her husband and their beautiful baby girl. After a couple of weeks in the Waukesha area, we moved on to the west to visit our friends and relatives in the NW part of the state. A couple of days into that part of the trip, we received a call from our obviously shaken daughter. Our grandson-in-law had committed suicide. Our daughter couldn't bring herself to tell us anymore than he'd died during that call. We cancelled the rest of our planned stops and headed back to the SE part of the state for more than a week. He was a Lieutenent on the Waukesha Sheriff's Department. We'd only met him twice before that week, but he gave no indication he might be considering such a drastic step. They lived in Jackson and a local patrol officer found him slumped over on a park bench. He'd shot himself with his service weapon. He left behind our granddaughter, his baby girl, and two other beautiful little girls and a son by his previous marriage. We'd already "adopted" those bonus great-grandkids and stay in touch with them through their mom on a regular basis. They still don't understand why their daddy left them, and we don't either. Since then, our granddaugter, who is a 911 dispatcher,  has become involved in an organization of spouses of law-enforcement officers who have committed suicide. We never realized that it's a BIG problem all over the country for all types of first responders (including 911 dispatchers.) Wish we knew of a "cure" for it, but it's beyond understanding for us.

Barbara Blair (Brenzel)

Lauren,

My heart goes out to you.  My father committed suicide shortly after my daughter was born - so very many years ago now.  I knew he was depressed, starting with the death of my mother a few years previously, but I never dreamed in a million years that he thought of suicide,  The shock was so great as well as the loss,

It is difficult for me to write this and I am hoping that it will help you in some small way.  It does get easier as time goes on.  I will never say that the pain goes away - it only lessons.  I have found that it does help to talk about it and also to be able to reach out to others that you know are hurting.  There are many that are hurting.

I do want to say a thank you to you, Garry, for keeping this website going and foe all the kooky things you post on it.  Very appreciated!

A Blessed Easter to all.

Barb

Jim Cejka

Garry Sellers

With all the humor we've posted about the virus I've been concerned that we may have a classmate directly impacted by its spread.  Well ... it's happened.

On Easter Sunday Terri Levenhagen Hoorstra's husband Jon succumbed to the ravages of the virus and his long, valiant battle with COPD.  Jon did not pass alone.  Terri and their son were by his side.  Terri has posted more details on her Facebook page.

I know all of her friends and especially her classmates who have seen Terri's thoughtful contributions to this website over the years send her our warm and caring hugs. 

Terri Levenhagen (Hoornstra)

 Thank you for the kind words, Garry. Actually Jon had caught a different virus - not corona - on Feb. 2,  just ahead of the COVID epidemic. It was identified as "metapneumo". It is also a newer virus, discovered in 2003. It is supposed have mild symptoms for healthy people, but like COVID, wreaks havoc on people with compromised health. So with Jon's COPD, it really destroyed the little bit of breathing he had left. I caught it too, and even with my mild athsma that hardly ever bothers me, I was coughing and wheezing for 2 weeks. I take my hat off to the wonderful medical staff at Kaiser LA Medical Center. They took amazing care of him, and happily set up his laptop for Face Time calls after we were banned from visiting. He was like part of their family by the time he was there 2 months! And now they are battling the "other" virus, and had a lot of good practice doing so with Jon. 

Lauren Dieterich

I didn't need to hear that. Saturday will be a year since my son died. It still feels like yesterday. You have my deepest heartfelt sympathy. Here is a hug from me ((((( Teri )))))

Jim Cejka

Crisis, what crisis?

William Nelson

Our home was directly across the street from 36th Street Elementary School. Part of the playground and a small parking lot separated it from what was then, Custer High School. We moved there from the South Side (near 23rd and Greenfield) in the summer of 1953, when I was in the middle of 4th grade. When I "graduated" from there at the end of 6th grade, I attended Custer High School for the first semester in 7th grade. I was elected to the CHS student council while I was still 11-years old. I felt out of place at the meetings, but a couple of the seniors, made special efforts to include us in discussions and welcome us to the school. After that summer vacation in 1955, my older brother and his classmates all moved to the new CHS we all graduated from. All of a sudden, I was back to reality and there were only 8th and 9th grades at Edison. Those couple of years were memorable, because, despite removing the top four grades, they began enlarging the school to nearly twice its former size. That activity began with demolishing the north end of the building. Every time the wrecking ball hit, everyone would cringe. Several times, there was a lineup at the pencil sharpeners as a lot of leads were broken in the process.

I didn't know Roger Pederson yet, but had his dad as my metal shop instructor in 8th grade at Edison. My dad was also an Industrial Arts teacher, and he and Rodger's dad were good friends. The first semester of 7th grade, I had Mr. Eberhart for wood shop. He and my dad had been roommates in college at Oshkosh State Teachers College. The 2nd semester, when all the destruction began, we took our shop class in the basement of the old 36th Street School. My cousin (in-law), the late Tom Williams, was the teacher in that shop for several years. When I moved into the new CHS in January, Mr. Eberhart became my drafting teacher. 

Rodger and I first met on the stage crew, as I remember. He worked at a hobby store at Capitol Court. Think it was called the Hobby Horse. He introduced me to my first wife, but I won't hold that against him. 

The old 36th Street School was torn down a few years later, well after I'd graduated from CHS. My dad had retired by then and he used to walk over there and "supervise" the destruction. Actually, he talked the crews out of some of the materials, like oak and maple, that were going to be trashed. We still have some of that material that was made into various projects by him, my brother, and me.

Sandy Wachs (Oldham)

Bill I loved your post about the history of the 36th street school.  So much fun to hear about your ties to 'Shop' classes and Rodger Peterson.  Fun.

Garry you mentioned that you wondered how gymnastics was going to hold up during this crisis.  I guess time will tell.  Many of our club programs will not make it through this shut down.  Club owners are better coaches than business minds.  They love the sport and the kids they work with, but forget that they have to operate to make money.  Clubs are having many virtual workouts with their gymnasts, and having virtural competitions with video's of their routines.  Judges are judging on line for free.  Judges generally are not in the business of judging for the money either.  We just love our sport.

I worry about our NCAA Gymnastics Programs that have really been building on successful TV coverage.  I have had the incredable experience of judging many NCAA National Championships and awarding a fair share of 10's.  I can tell you it is just as exciting for the judge as it is for the gymnasts and crowd.  I sure hope it survives.  One note:  I met a Big Ten Football official at a party, and as shy as I am, I asked him how much money he made officating a game.  He said 85.  Oh $85.  No $8,500.  And I said I got paid 65.  He said oh $6,500.  Nope $65!  ALL his expenses where paid for.  I got $100 to cover my drive to airport and parking, local transportation at out of town meet,and food.  They did cover my hotel room.  Big Ten Football vs Women's Gymnastics.

At the Olympic level there are many questions.  The most important question is will our GOAT Simone Biles continue on for an extra year.  She was set to retire in 2020.  So hope she can hang in there.  I have been involved in the sport for over 60 years and there has never been another athlete in our sport who has dominated like she has.  She does skills that no one in the world can do.  I love to watch her compete because she does her routines with joy.  I sure hope I see her in Toyko.  If you have ever been to Japan, you know how well they know how to get things done well.  These Olympics will be amazing for everyone to enjoy.

Sorry go on for so long, but gymnastics has been one of my passions.  I guess Garry will never ask me a question again.  

Everyone stay safe and healthy!  

Jim Cejka

Garry Sellers

Lauren, or maybe it was you Jim -  Was it you who lived on 35th Street near the streetcar turn around at Silver Spring?  If you read the new tab "Originis of the "Custer HS" name" in the left hand column, you'll see a photo I found online showing a streetcar parked on 35th in front of the K&K Food Mart.  My folks had an account there and all we had to do was walk in with my Mom's shopping list and they'd get it for you and put it on our bill.  Next door was a bakery that wafted of all manner of sweet pastries.  My Dad would go there every Sunday before church and bring home chocolate covered Long Johns and Crawlers ,,, still warm!!!