Al Schultz:  

I had heard some talk that there might be a 25 year reunion for our class and I had heard through the grapevine that a bunch of our classmates were on this site so I'd thought I'd check it out and say "hi". As some of you may remember I pretty much just worked and did the school thing during my high school years. Starting in the 9th grade at Cedar Heights I began cutting firewood and logging (working on the log landing with Seth Lester for his Dad - Seth is still around and doing well). By the end of my Junior year at South I had purchased 5 acres of raw land out by Carney Lake (My Dad had to co-sign with me because I was under 21, but he made it abundantly clear I was on my own for the payments!) I joined the Marine Corps and left for boot camp one week after we graduated and got to tour the world and see a lot of the United States as one of Uncle Sam's Misguided Children... what an eye-opener for the skinny kid from Po-Dunk! I was Honorably Discharged from the Marines in 1988 and sold back a lot of my accrued leave. Typical of the military I was given $250 up front of my leave money (I was supposed to get a little over $1300). The Marines would be gracious enough to send me the remainder of my money to my parents home in Port Orchard. I wanted to return back to Port Orchard to my friends and family in the worst way, but life was about to deal me a twist... At the time I was still paying on my land near Carney Lake, and driving a lifted up 4x4 Chevy K-5 Blazer. It was an awesome rig with a trick stereo system I had purchased overseas in Japan... Problem was it averaged less than 10 miles a gallon with the hopped up 350 engine I had built and put in her and the oversize "look good" tires I had on it trashed my ball joints in the front end. Coincidentally they (the ball joints) went out on me the day of my discharge as I was driving off the military base. Just like that $200 of my $250 was gone. (I only had the $250 the military gave me to get back... back then I was a young stud jarhead and lived in the barracks so I spent my paychecks on whiskey and women, the rest of it I just wasted...) After replacing the ball joints I only had $50 dollars left and I decided to take that as far as it would get me (I was in North Carolina at the time). I ran out of money in Gainesville, GA and began looking for work that day. I only had $5 left to run around town with so I put that in my gas tank and fortunately landed a job at a tool and die shop in town shortly after (Thank you Chuck Jesch for the Vocational Machine Shop courses!). The problem was I had to work there two weeks before I would see my first pay check... I wasn't about to beg or borrow anything from anybody and I didn't know anyone in that area so I slept in the rear of my Blazer, and fished and bathed in the Chattahoochee River. It was kind of like being on a 2 week camping/fishing trip. I ate catfish, bass and trout for two weeks with wild greens I picked and cooked along the river over a fire pit. I handwashed laundry and air dried it. It sounds bad but it only lasted 2 weeks and I was alone, but I was worrying about making that land payment back in Washington! After the two weeks went by, I got paid (Dang, a hamburger never tasted so good!) and rented the upstairs of a split level house in Alta, GA. I made friends with a lot of elderly folks in the area that were living like something out of a Foxfire Book! I sure learned a lot from them! I'd take them fishing, for drives in the mountains and just on picnics. I worked graveyard at the tool and die shop and in the mornings they would have some homemade cookies and coffee or sweet tea set out for me when I'd come by and check up on them. A lot of mornings before I went home I'd swing by and sit outside with them and visit. I still remember the fragrant aroma of honeysuckle and magnolia blossoms on the breeze and hearing the wild turkeys gobbling down in the woods. After about six months living there I had fell in love with the south, the people, the seasons, the girls with their accents, everything! I even sold my property near Carney Lake and was looking at buying ground there in Georgia. The shop I worked in wasn't union and I had been promoted and was running the graveyard shift. Some less ambitious folks with more seniority ended up working for me (which was difficult at first). I was having an awesome time! The money was good for that area, I'd made a lot of new friends and was having the time of my life! (Come to think of it though, since I graduated every year just seems better than the ones before! Life is wonderful!) But then again, life tossed me a curve... my folks had been having marital problems and it came to a head. They were getting divorced and it wasn't a smooth one. I took a week off from work and flew back to see what I could do (which wasn't much). While I was back I stayed with my folks, visited some old friends from school, which was kind of awkward because they hadn't left Port Orchard since we graduated and I had been all over the world, fought in Libya, been all over the United States, and had a great job. All they talked about was high school and by now more than 4 years had gone by. I visited Seth Lester and his folks as well. Seth had his own business driving log truck and logging and was doing pretty well. His sister Kim, whom I had always had a crush on, was still living at home and had her own business as a court reporter. Anyway, I was so smitten with Kim and my desire to return "home" to Port Orchard that the week after I returned to Georgia from my trip to Washington I put in my two weeks notice and quit my job with the goal of returning to Washington to start chasing Kim. I drove back to Washington in my Blazer across country. Somewhere along the line, the gas tank in my old Chevy rusted through and started leaking. About every two hours I had to crawl underneath it and rub a bar of Lava soap over the rust spots to stop the leaks, after about 2 hours the soap would dissovle and I had to do it all over again. When I got up to Washington I immediately drove to "The 4x4 Shop" (kind of a wrecking yard place that used to be up on mile hill) to look for a used gas tank to replace my leaky one. I found a replacement tank and also walked out of there with a job as an outside mechanic, I hadn't been in town 4 hours! I worked there for a few weeks before I got hired by Boeing as an electrician installing...Expand for more