Sally Keyes:
CLASS OF 1962
Shawano High SchoolClass of 1962
Shawano, WI
Northland CollegeClass of 1966
Ashland, WI
Sally's Story
"It has Never been my Intention
To TipToe through Life
Only to Arrive Safely at Death"
The original words in My Story were written five years ago, when I first registered on Facebook. It's now 2015, and about time, I think, that I bring My Story up-to-date!
Since High School, I'd say that I've been movin'! I've lived in Madison, Ashland, Beloit and South Range Wisconsin; Ft. Collins, Denver, and Georgetown Colorado; Chicago, Bridgeview, Orland Park, Yorkville, and Oswego Ilinois; Milford Connecticut; and now, and lastly, here in Duluth, Minnesota. When I moved here, I'd intended to only stay for a year or so, and then move to Alaska. But Duluth totally captured my heart. It's now been over 20 years, and Duluth truly feels like home to me. And I guess I just hadda keep movin' around 'til I found this place, a place where I really feel like I belong. And I truly feel like I belong right here in Duluth, Minnesota!
I have three daughters, Molly and Tiffany in Wisconsin and Mary Ellen in San Francisco, having moved there recently from .0New Zealand. (Maybe my penchant for travelin' on got passed on?)
Geographically, I now live half-way between Minnesota's Boundary Waters Canoe Area Wilderness and Wisconsin's Federally Protected Apostle Islands National Lakeshore. That should tell you something about where I stand environmentally.
Politically, I'm a little bit Left of Ted Kennedy and just a tad over from Dennis Kucinich and Paul Wellstone. I mourn the message and presence of JFK and Paul Wellstone. My "Go-To's" on TV are Chris Mathews, John Stewart, Bill Maher and Bill Moyers. LOL I lost 17 pounds in September, without even knowing it, working on the Obama campaign! Ninety-three percent of registered voters here vote, and I guarantee ya, they vote in the right, which is of course the Left, direction.
Musically, I'm into "American Routes", "Mountain Stage", David Dye and "World Cafe", and "Austin City Limits". KUMD,Duluth, WUMB,Boston, and Spindale, N.C., Radio, all of which are available online. Acoustic Music. I've been a long-term fan of John Denver and Bob Dylan. I love "The Band". I walk as often as I can with my music. I've built up a huge collection of tapes and CDs. From Pete Seeger, Woody and Arlo Guthrie, "Big Band" and Pete Seeger, Saffire and the Uppity Blues Women,
Crosby, Stills, Nash and Young, to Sam Bush, Allison Kraus,Ricky Skaggs, Alanis Morisette,Janis Joplin, and Tom Waits. Soft Rock, Bluegrass, Zydeco, Dixieland Jazz, Blues, Country Rock, just ALL of it! Well, not Classical Music. Never have liked Classical Music. I know that my collection of a gagillion tapes and CDs are a big part of what keeps me walking. That and new boots! LOTS of pairs of boots!
I've been married twice, joyfully divorcing the first one,after my mother died, and then losing the second suddenly to a massive heart attack. I've loved a million men, had my heart broken a million times. But when I lost Donnie, it was so different. Like a belly shot fr...Expand for more
om a helmeted linebacker, when you're wearing no protective padding. We'd watched birds, river rafted, and fished. Done Tastes of Chicago and ethnic fests. Lived and loved through a huge re-modeling project, much of which we did ourselves. Held hands through the unending squabble of yours and mine children. Haunted flea markets. Learned microwave and healthy heart eating together. Grilled. Raked and burned a zillions oak leaves. Tried to be first with the Wheel of Fortune puzzles. Walked and hiked. We'd auto-crossed and rallied, were both officers of the Illinois Sport Owner's Club. We'd played and performed in a Steal Drum Band. We'd danced and gone to concerts. And then, one morning, I awoke, and he was just dead. I was 42 years old, and he was just DEAD.
I coped with that by geting drunk for about a year-and-a-half. (I would not reommend that as a coping mechanism.) But I eventually moved back to Shawano, sobered-up, straightened myself out, ready to move-on again.
Tho I only worked profesionally for a couple of years,I was fired when I had a short relapse with MS,and there weren't the laws then that there are now which would have protected me, I've done a myriad of volunteer jobs through the years. The most fun was working hands-on with Black Bears in Ely, Minnesota, with Dr. Lynn Rogers. (And I thought loiving in the Rockies and climbing glaciers was a high!) TRUST ME,ya really haven't lived 'til you've knelt next to a MaMa Bear in her den, nursing her cubs, and picked one of them up to hold! Perhaps the most rewarding, my ten years volunteering with a Crisis Line in Joliet, Illinois, where I managed to fore-stall a number of suicides.
During my second semester in the Graduate School in Madison, I was diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis. Now I gotta admit that was a real head-butt to the gut. I'd had symptoms, which would now be diagnosable since I was 13, an probably before that, just not medically recognized. They checked me out of the hospital in a wheel chair and with two bottles of tranquilizes. The prognosis then was for a 20-year max life expectancy.
Well, and I'm sure I've been blessed. But it's been over 43 years since the diagnosis, over 53 years when, if doctors knew then what they know now, I could/should have been diagnosed. And sometimes I think that by shear force of will I right then and there just mentally said "When Pigs Fly", or something similar.
I'd honed my defiance skills dealing with the Marquis De Sade, who'd tried his best to best to beat the Spirit out of me. So I wasn't about to let the uncertain, nebulous,and stupid MS destroy that cherished Spirit. I pitched the wheelchair, dumped the pills, and, diploma in hand, I bought my first Mustang and moved to Colorado.
It's now all these years later, and even after total knee replacement last Winter, I'm still walkin' and talkin' and pushin' for what I see as needed changes and meaningful goals. And just waiting to see what comes next, moving on down the line.
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