I should have been much happier to have reached 70 - especially after having cancer 20 years ago. At the time I would have sold my soul for another 2 years. But now that I have reached 70 - I feel healthy and great - but it just sounds so darn old. I have already been retired 15 years! I am living off two pensions from the state of Pennsylvania and the federal government. I am firmly entrenched at the government trough.
It has been a short and wonderful road. I have experienced so much - and have had relatively few hardships. I have been sheltered by my parents - my sisters - my schools - my wife - my job - and my government. My life has been a life of wheels. My mother always said that the Everharts had gypsy blood in them. I guess that started when my grandfather decided to leave his wife and 4 kids to eventually join the Merchant Marines and die when the tip of a German torpedo entered his station in the engine room on a ship off the coast of the Dominican Republic in 1942. I have had the pleasure of wheeling through 7 of the best decades - I was born into interesting times.
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| The house I was born in |
The 1950s. I was born in an old farmhouse south of Tamaqua PA - we had a television but no plumbing. The doctor arrived by horse sled in the dead of winter and I arrived about 7 hours later on February 6th. 1948. My birth cost $15. Dad was a coal miner and Mom worked at a factory in town - so I was sometimes left to the care of my sisters - just 3 and 6 years older than me. I have long romanticised those wonder years - and sometimes considered going back and buying that house to die there.
The 1960s. After one month in a one-room school - we moved into town so that I could attend a school with 6 classrooms. The 60s were my wonder years from age 12 to age 22. I enjoyed the Beatles and Rolling Stones through a telescope from Tamaqua PA. The mines had closed down and my Dad took a job 90 miles away near Philadelphia. My Mom refused to move the family there and held down the fort with 3 kids and worked in a dress factory downtown. I had the pleasure of independence in a small town of 8000 people. We had good teachers and good schools that influenced me to become a teacher. I went to Kutztown State Teachers College about 40 miles away. 4 years later I had a bachelor's degree and a teacher's license. I was set for life. In 1969 - as a lifeguard at the community pool - I met the love of my life. I asked Lulu to go to the Woodstock Music Festival with me in my new Volkswagen - her Mom said no - but I went anyway.
The 1970s. Cars were a big thing in my life - even back then. Wheels were the freedom that got us to Washington - Gettysburg - Philadelphia - New York City. In 1971 - we eloped and eventually ended in Miami for the summer. It was our first contact with the wonderful state of Florida. My bride wanted to stay there and start her new life on the beach. I chose to return to the Valley and my dependable teaching job. Lulu went to my Alma Mater and became a school librarian in town. While she was still a student - we bought a cedar home kit - and built our family home on a site where we could see the spot we met. We bought a tour bus and made several trips to Florida - enjoying Disneyworld and Cape Canaveral. We founded a newspaper in town - I was the publisher - Lulu was the editor. When the kids came - I realized how much she did and how little I did - we sold The Tamaqua Paper to Russ Funk.
The 1980s. Most of our time was spent raising our sons that arrived in 1977 and 1978. We owned buses - minivans - and campers. Someone once said the Everharts will never go to Hawaii because you can't drive there. I took two sabbaticals and Lulu earned her Master's and Doctor's degrees in Florida. I found out what it felt like to be a mother of 2 toddlers - ages 3 and 2 - while Lulu went to school and worked from 9 to 9. I will never look at a mother's work with anything but respect after that.
In 1990s. My 5th decade was spent enjoying our kids in high school - driving to see them play basketball - and spending summers in North Carolina - Georgia - Arizona - Hawaii - and New York where Lulu taught summer sessions at colleges. While she was busy building a reputation - I had the joy of touring with my sons. Whether it was a snowy motorhome trip to Syracuse to see the Seminoles play football or a long train ride to Miami to attend the Orange Bowl with Mohammed Ali - it was the best time of our lives until then. Next - it was pestering our kids as they earned degrees at Duke - Georgetown - University of Miami - and Florida State University. Our empty nest was a really hard void to fill.
In 2000s. After 33 years of teaching in the same school - at age 55 I retired from the Panther Valley School District. Lulu already had been a professor at St John's University in New York City for 10 years - so I offered to follow her dreams wherever it would go. She was immediately recruited by Florida State University. After inviting her to come to campus as a guest speaker - they offered her a contract on the spot. We would sell our cedar chalet home of 30 years - and move to Tallahassee. It was September Shock.
September Shock is a term I made up to describe a change that people go through only once. It happens the first year you do not go back to school in September after enjoying a summer off. Some people experience it at 18 - they go back to high school to hang around. Others it happens at 22 when they finish college. When I finished college - in September I went right back to school - but this time as a teacher. I was in a classroom at Panther Valley teaching some kids that were only 2 and 3 years younger than me. It was my one real job. I retired on my 55th birthday.
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| 2012 Olympics - Lulu teaches in London in the summer |
I moved to Tallahassee cold turkey. I went from being a popular teacher in town - the president of the school board - the owner of a newspaper and print shop - a tour bus operator - a father of two busy sons - to being a trailing spouse - a retired teacher - a lame duck - alone in a new town - where my wife was busy becoming a tenured professor at a research one university. I was "eye candy" on her arm :-) I was a thousand miles away from my closest relatives and looking for things to justify my existence. It's a whole new world. I now lived in a town with over 500 places to eat coming from a place where one of the top 5 places to eat had Golden Arches out front. I could still watch football but instead of 1000 people watching the Raiders play the Panthers - I was in the shadow of 80,000 seat Doak Campbell Stadium and the National Champion Seminoles.
The 2010s. Now I finish my 7th decade. I am healthier now than when I retired 15 years ago - but 70 does not have a nice ring to it. When the "Loving Spoonful" sang "a quarter of my life is almost past" I could never have imagined singing about "when 95% of my life is almost past." Lulu fills my life with wonderfulness. Grandkids grace my life now. My kids have done well and they are busy nurturing their kids through the first decade. We travel a lot in Lulu's job. In 2018 - we will travel to - March in Belgium - April in Hawaii - May in Greece - June in Germany - July in England. We have a new to us camper that sits waiting for us to have time to see the USA in your Chevrolet.
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| Our camper |
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| The Everhart 9 |
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| Our sunset years in Tallahassee |
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