Phyllis Barr:  

Hi to all my classmates. Back in high school, I remember I was very shy. Over the years I have overcome that somewhat. I got married to my high school sweetheart, Gary Lamb, in the February following graduation. I had just turned 19 years of age. we had a small but nice wedding, in the Church I grew up in. I started working in a small grooming shop owned by one of my friends, as a bather. I enjoyed that, and started to learn how to groom the dogs. I was there 3 years, Then we bought 27 acres in Diamond Springs. It was raw land, but beautiful property, just didn't have any paved roads, elelectricity or water. Little problem. We decided to purchase a small trailer and move up there, after we were both offered a job at a new pizza parlor that was being built on Old Placerville Rd. We were friends of the owners girlfriend, so eveything just fell into place we were able to move up to our land we bought. We moved up, cleared a patch of land, put up a gate leading down to our area and graveled the road, and it worked for us. We were way up on top of a mountain, away from everyone. It was beautiful.. Our trailer was only about 8ft wide and 26ft long. Not a whole lot of room, but it was cozy. We plugged the trailer into our car and used 12 volt for our electicity and power. Of course we had propane for gas. We had no hot water, so we would fill up 5 gallon jugs and bring them home from work to take a bath. We had to haul our water up the mountain, in 55 gallon drums, two at a time. It was an experience that I enjoy looking back on. After a couple of years we upgraded to a bigger and newer trailer. It was like a mansion after the first one. I remember we paid $500.00 for our first trailer, but to me it was awesome. We had built a small room outside the front door, and put a small woodburning stove in it so our four big dogs would have a place to come in and stay warm. After three years, we sold the property and bought a two story fixer upper house surrounded by a little over an acre of land. It was the last house on a dead end street, probably the only street in Fresh Pond that had houses or cabins on it. Fresh Pond is just a blink of an eye past Pollock Pines up Highway 50 going up towards Tahoe. It was so beautiful and peaceful up there. We had a great time fixing up house. About a year later, the restaurant was sold so we were out of a job. Six months earlier a poor women that owned a small grooming shop in Pollock Pines was killed by a snow shoveling truck. We were out of work, so we got this crazy idea to rent the place were the grooming shop had been. That was the only grooming shop in town. Folks had to drive to Placerville to get their dogs groomed, which was a...Expand for more