Judith Kalley:  

Life I have gotten remarried. On July 7, 2001 after dating for more than 5 years I married the true love of my life. We used to live in New Jersey but life has taken a LOT of twists and turns since then. We moved to Branson, Missouri for a while where we bought a large number of investment properties. Unfortunately, with rental properties in order to pay your mortgage you need people who will rent from you and we could not manage to keep them rented and we lost all of our homes . 2008 was a bad year to try real estate. Then we moved to Zuni New Mexico where my husband was teaching on the reservation. Zuni is an interesting place to visit (maybe) but not to live. Issues with getting his state license caused my husband's job to be eliminated and when my contract was up we left New Mexico. Teaching at Zuni was a challenge because where as the students are basically polite and decent kids the whole Zuni nation is extremely apathetic about the "white mans education" and really do not care to learn. Zuni is a very poor community (almost every family is on governmental support) and strong into its ancient traditions still. The medicine man is still called for things we take for granted and either treat with OTC medicine or see an MD for. It was quite a change for us but we know that that move was GOD's leading. We spent a summer criss-crossing the country looking for a H.S. math teaching job for my husband. He has a degree in Mathematics and a Master's Degree in Mathematical Finance and then went back to school and got his teaching certificate. We found many jobs but no money to pay him. Eventually we gave up and I took a job. That brought us to Georgia where we lived for just over 3 years. Georgia is where we still call home I am an Occupational Therapy Assistant. When we lived in Zuni I worked for a staffing agency that placed me in the Gallup McKinley School System in the town of Gallup about 30 miles off the Rez. The Gallup McKinley school system is bigger than the state of New Jersey but I stayed in town and did schools there. I could have stayed there another school year but Gallup is a desert area with not much in the way of shopping or entertainment and to barren for our tastes so we left and now live here in Jesup GA. Again I used my staffing company and again I work for the school system in Wayne County. I loved it! I am the only OT therapist to regularly see the students so I have a ton of responsibility but also a ton of freedom. PLUS-- Jesup is a great small town (Mayberry like from the old Andy Griffith Show) and much bigger towns are not that far north or south of here. Satwas teaching at the local tech college a few classes every quarter but they never made him full time. ...Expand for more