Becky Mathis:
CLASS OF 1971
Phoenix High SchoolClass of 1971
Phoenix, OR
Ida Flood Dodge Magnet Middle SchoolClass of 2007
Tucson, AZ
University of OregonClass of 1975
Eugene, OR
Eugene Business CollegeClass of 1974
Eugene, OR
Becky's Story
During my Senior year of high school Mom started calling me "BJ". That became the name I have used ever since.
After high school I attended the University of Oregon for about four semesters and then took an interest test. Ended up going to Eugene Business College for a year. I was offered a job at an accounting firm as office manager and bookkeeper.
I met Jack Mathis at the Business College. He joined the Air Force in February of 1975 and we were married in May 1975. I moved with him to Denver for his technical training and then to Tucson for his first assignment to Davis-Monthan AFB.
After we got to Tucson we got a newspaper clipping from Jack's Dad. It seems the owner of the accounting firm was laundering money. Boy was I glad I hadn't kept that job!
I spent a lot time in the hospital during the first two years of our marriage. I had a rare condition that is too complicated to go into.
The doctors finally figured out how to help me and we had our first child, Timothy in 1977.
In 1978 Jack was assigned to Bentwaters Air Base in England. We were there three years and had another son, Christopher, in 1980.
Jack managed to get reassigned to the base in Tucson.
We bought a house, did a lot of renovations and improvements.
We bought a Texas Instruments 99/4A Home Computer and got involved in the world of computers. We joined the local computer group and I eventually became the President of the group for several years. The group hosted Computer "Fests" several times and TI 99/4A users from all over the world traveled to Tucson for them.
Jack was able to avoid orders moving us out of Tucson until 1993. At that time Jack was assigned to Osan AFB in Korea. He was not allowed to take his family, so the boys and I stayed in our house in Tucson.
While Jack was in Korea I was talked into volunteering at my son's middle school. That turned into a job as a campus monitor, then attendance clerk and in less than six years I was the office manager!
Jack returned from Korea in 1994 and retired from the Air Force in 1995. He earned two ...Expand for more
Associate Degrees and got several Certificates for computer programming. He became a computer programmer for Pima County. While there he "bought back his military time." that allowed him to retire from the county in 2007 with a retirement income equal to having worked for the county for 32 years!
Tim, our older son, married Wendy, moved to Phoenix, Arizona. He became a chef at a large resort, had two sons and then moved to Missouri to be a chef at one of the casinos there. He is now the Executive Chef at a large hospital and his wife is a middle school Math teacher.
Chris met a wonderful woman, Cheryl, on eHarmony, married her, moved to Wisconsin, had a boy and a girl, and works as a computer security administrator.
In 2005 it became necessary for me to have both hips replaced. One was done the end of September and the other the end of December. I missed 6 weeks of work each time, but only took a couple weeks to get caught up again. The pain was greatly diminished but full recovery has been slow. Since then I have had to have several more surgeries on the left hip, as the metal-on-metal hip has caused me lots of problems.
Once Jack retired from Pima County i knew I wanted to move back to Oregon before he found another job. We found a house in Medford just down the street form my Mom. I retired from my job (early retirement) the end of January 2008 and we moved to Medford.
The morning after I finally arrived there was 6 inches of snow on the ground! We had snow two or three times during the 30+ years we lived in Tucson - a couple inches each time that would be melted by noon or so!
We have done lot of work on this house. We rented out the house in Tucson and have bought some other rentals in the Medford area.
I am loving having the time and weather to allow me to work in the garden, paint pictures, re-finish furniture, take painting classes, sewing, reading and spending time with Mom, my brothers and their families. I also joined Southern Oregon Society of Artists (SOSA) and became the Treasurer.
I am on Facebook, look for BJ Mathis.
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