Amy Diebaren:  

Life Right after my freshman year at MSU, my folks moved to Farmington Hills, MI, NW of Detroit. I lost track of most of my classmates at that point, although I made it to two reunions, with two different husbands! I've been married twice. I met my first husband, Richard Schultze, of Louisville, KY, at MSU, and we were married in December of 1974. We moved to Olean, NY, where I taught special ed, and he subbed in local school districts for a while, and then worked at the regional planning agency in our county. We moved to Columbus, OH, in 1976, where Richard was in a grad program at Ohio State. We had a daughter, Emily, in 1981, my only child. We split up before she was quite a month old, and Emily & I moved back to Michigan, living with my folks for about 3 years. I remarried in 1984, Bill Kern from Farmington Hills, a family friend. He was a tool & die maker then, and later taught himself CAD/CAM. He was a great Dad, and we are still close friends. After 16 years married to Bill, I took the scary but necessary step of coming out as a lesbian. Family and most friends were shaken, but supportive. I moved to Madison in 2002 to be with my current partner, Julie Sherwood, who runs the Chrysler Training Center outside of Milwaukee. She's planning to retire at age 53 in June--early retirement packages are a wonderful thing! I'm sure I'm not the only gay person in our class, although I don't know if anyone else is open about it. Emily graduated from Northwestern University in 2004. She's now 25 and a consultant with Stockamp. Her clients are non-profit hospitals--she's worked on Long Island, in DC, and now in Dayton OH, which is nice because that's near where her bio dad, stepmother, and 2 half brothers are. Home for her is still in Farmington. She lives with Jacob Smith, her boyfriend since high school. Jacob is an MSU grad, and teaches middle school social studies and coaches soccer in White Lake. They're two great young people, and we're all very proud of them. ...Expand for more