Lana Mountford:  

Life I retired in May 2003 after a 32-yr career in high-tech, ending with 5.5 years in database design at Amazon.com (got in just as the ".com bubble" was rising -- can you say "stock options"?). I decided finally to finish that music degree I started just out of high school, and after 3 years graduated from Seattle Pacific University in June 2006, majoring in conducting, composition, and voice. I went on to do a M.Mus. in Mus. History & Literature at Western Washington University in Bellingham, WA, where I currently live. Married 1971; divorced 1988. Lived all over -- South Carolina (1977), Washington, D.C. area (1978-1981), and San Francisco area(1981-1997). Started singing seriously in 1993, made professional opera debut in 1996 (Dolcina in Suor Angelica; Marcellina in La Nozze di Figaro). I moved to Seattle from the San Francisco Bay area to take the job at Amazon.com in 1997, and I really love the Pacific NW. Amazon was a wonderful company to work for, but after 5+ years of 60-70-hr work weeks, I was ready to move on. I own a condo in Bellingham, WA (where I attended grad school) which is currently inhabited by my brother, Lowell, and his wife. I currently live as an independent resident in an assisted living facility after a few fairly major health issues: a brain tumor in 2014, pulmonary embolism in 2020; avoided COVID, thank heavens, but have some breathing issues). Before the health issues kicked in, I did a lot of traveling -- smaller cruise ships mostly -- Alaska, the Arctic (Greenland, Iceland, Norway), Central and South America, and the South Pacific. I was on a 131-day World Cruise in 2020 when the pandemic hit and the cruise ended in Perth, Australia, after only 51 days. Currently, I read a lot, am fairly active in a local P.E.O. chapter, enjoy crafts projects of various sorts and almost always have 2 or 3 in varying degrees of completion. School When I think of Ruskin, I think of Mr. Tarry, the choir director. He was amazing, totally dedicated, and influenced me more than he could ever have known. I had him for Music Appreciation and Music Theory as well. He opened up the world of choral music and for that I'll be forever grateful. I also think about Mr. Wrisinger, the school paper, and the Categories team. Great fun -- and I really learned how to write in his class. Those were the experiences that made high school worth it. Apart from those, it was pretty dismal, and I wouldn't repeat the experience under any circumstances. College After one horrendous year at Wi...Expand for more