Bob Green:
CLASS OF 1981
Grimsley High SchoolClass of 1981
Greensboro, NC
Western Connecticut State UniversityClass of 1994
Danbury, CT
Kiser Middle SchoolClass of 1977
Greensboro, NC
Bluford Elementary SchoolClass of 1974
Greensboro, NC
Mill Ridge Primary SchoolClass of 1973
Danbury, CT
Bob's Story
Life
After graduating from Grimsley I went to Guilford College for one semester but was not at all sure what I was doing there. I fell into a part time Xmas job with K&K Toys at the Carolina Circle Mall and stayed with them for 8 years until they found out from a friends jilted girlfriend who worked for the company that I am Gay. They fired me for being Gay though none of my employees knew and I had a track record of all Above Average or Outstanding reviews with the company. In fact when they fired me I was arguably their best Senior District Manager. However it is still legal to fire an American in 38 states just for being Gay or Lesbian.
I was much sought after by TOYS R US but didn't want to work for their Evil Empire and chose to go back to college at age 26 and received my BA in Communication and Theatre Arts at age 30. I had a fantastic college experience in theatre with great acclaim and great reviews as an Actor, Director, Stage Manager. I've been professionally paid to Act and Stage Manage. My big claim to fame (for now) was a wonderfully received one act I directed off-Broadway, however it was such a personal dissapointment to me. The other one-act appearing with my show was directed by one of my theatre Professors and he did all he could to back stab me and ruin my show-he didn't succeed at this but really made me realize I didn't want the unease of working with people like that in my professional life) so I chose to not do my art as my career.
So I returned to my second love, retail management, with a gay friendly company,KAY-BEE Toys in their superstore division TOYWORKS. Interestingly KAYBEE had bought K&KToys and after checking out my story(which was supported by their VP of Stores who had also been the VP of Stores for KAYBEE at the time of my dismissal). So in effect they rehired me. I left them after 3 years when I saw the writing on the wall for the toy businesses tough times and moved to the cadillac of retailers Barnes & Noble where I've been for over 8 years.
I'm currently managing a new store for them in Canton, CT.
I'm single and somehow avoided the AIDS epidemic that swept through in the later part of the 20th Century tho...Expand for more
ugh I lost a good Grimsley friend and one time lover, Robert St. John to that awful disease (and I hear that Craig Ferguson of Grimsley also past away from the same cause). And now the Bush administration is turning a blind eye as the disease is snowballing through the African-American community and gaining a strong foothold in the straight community overall.
My family has departed the our old northeast stomping grounds of New York and Connecticut. My parents have retired to both a bayou side house in Florida on Sanibel Island and a lake side house in Indiana. My sister Wendy and her husband David live in Florida and my other sister Laurie lives in Indiana with her husband Carl and their two kids, one of whom started college in 2004. I also have a step-nephew in Michigan from Carl's first wife. All three kids are fantastic human beings, warm, smart, funny and goodlooking. For any of you who remember our dog Rufus, he passed away from kidney failure related causes back in the early mid-80's. I moved to Indianapolis in October 2006 to be near my parents both of whom were diagnosed with cancer. For a while it looked like we might lose them both. Thankfully they've both beaten back the cancer and are doing well, although dad still has lots of health issues and he's grumpier than ever (which is saying a lot). Just starting to settle down here in Carmel, Indiana, a suburb, just north of Indianapolis. Amazingly this is a fairly gay friendly area. Thankfully, the youth of America is much more progressive than their parents (it seems no matter where they live). This bodes well for the future of the country and the planet.
School
I look back fondly on most of my time at Grimsley. Playmasters, "Z", Summerstock at the Weaver Center, and working at the school store among others. My best times were certainly with Dick Zaruba and Playmasters. Remember the boycott? Talk about guerilla theatre. We had balls! How about the time in Puppetmania when Chris Lenz told that lesbian joke to a group of five year olds and three of their moms! "Our Town" on the front lawn after my empassioned Oliver Wendell Douglas(from Green Acres) speech when they took the stage from us?
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