Jane Sharp:  

Oregon State University was my destination the fall after graduation. I worked on the school newspaper and lived in the dorms. I was an RA when Gene Sharp's son from his first marriage wandered into my life. {Gene was an electrician and then insurance salesman in John Day and lived across the street from us.} We were married in December of 1967 and moved to San Diego CA, where he had grown up and was newly employed by Pacific Southwest Airlines. I graduated from San Diego State University with a BA in Math and Journalism in June, 1970, had our first baby, and then finished my teaching credential. We bought some property and a small two bedroom house 20 miles east of San Diego and for the next ten years I raised babies, pigs, bees, and a calf a year, plus tons of veggies. We enlarged our 900 sq. ft. house to a 3000 sq. ft., 5 bedroom expanded living space, and did most of the work ourselves. Not at all the life I had pictured for myself, but I loved it. Made some lifelong friends, became very involved in Girl Scouts, and volunteered at the local grade school. Then in the spring of 1983, a friend called to ask if I'd be interested in working at a 750-student Jr-Sr High School 23 miles from my house. They needed a math teacher who could also be the yearbook/newpaper adviser. With the youngest of my four children turning four, it seemed a good time to consider working, and that fall I became a math teacher at Mountain Empire Jr. Sr. High School. Sadly, less than a month after I began work, Gene Sharp passed away. Buddy decided he had been abandoned by his father AND his wife. We tried to make things work for a couple of years; but two separations, a ton of counseling, and a huge legal bill later, I was a single mother after 19.5 years of marriage. I returned to Oregon for three years, living in Eugene near my parents and my sisters; but there was little opportunity to work, and I hated the rain. My oldest daughter lived with Lida and had graduated high school by then, so the three younger children and I moved to "Hell Centro" near Yuma AZ. It was close enough for the kids to visit their dad easily but far enough not to run into him in the grocery store. ...Expand for more