I came of age in the early 60s. At a time when little was expected of women except to marry and bear children. That was fine with me, because I hadn’t planned nor was I encouraged to pursue any kind of career. While in high school, I completed the required typing and shorthand courses that were expected of you if you were a girl. Although this proved to be a total disaster for me and it became abundantly clear, a secretarial position wasn’t going to be a part of my working career.

An unplanned pregnancy followed by a marriage of convenience fulfilled the basic plan for my life. However, from that point on, I became a tumbleweed. Certainly the why of my choices, were, at times, puzzling. Things such as why did I chose to move from a new modern home to a three-room shack without inside facilities or running water?

Things I’d grown up with and took for granted; flush toilets, a tub where pulling the plug let the water out, etc. These same things weren’t normally available to either me or my neighbors in the Southeastern Ohio town I settled in. Outhouses and hauling water by hand was more the norm here.

When the second of her children, a daughter, was eighteen-months old, Maryellen began driving a school bus for the county-wide school system. It was a trial-by-fire for this central Californian woman who, prior to that, hadn’t driven any kind of vehicle in the snow. With a quaking heart, she learned to drive her 40-foot school bus on gravel roads that rarely saw a snowplow. The job was a far cry from the secretarial work she was sure she’d hate, but she fell in love with driving a school bus.

Her lifestyle vastly improved three years later with the purchase of a large double-wide home and the addition of a large cistern for water storage. It was a huge improvement over lugging the 10 plus-gallons of water several times a day by hand up a steep hill. This was a trial-by-fire point in my life. I passed.

Her lifestyle vastly improved three years later with the purchase of a large double-wide home and the addition of a large cistern for water storage. It was a huge improvement over lugging the 10 plus-gallons of water several times a day by hand up a steep hill. This was a trial-by-fire point in my life. I passed.

Fourteen years later Mary Ellen became a single parent. She did her best to support her four children. Homesick, she returned to California, were I found a job driving a school bus for San Juan School District. The pay and benefits were great, but that was offset by the job only being part time. This didn’t even come close to covering basic living expenses. She considered other jobs.