I'd also like to thank an old childhood friend and old neighbor for all the support she gave me via e-mail and want to remind her Jeanette Harrington that she still owes me some brewskies but fruit juice will do. Wow I have a lot of thanking to do when I think about it! also many thanks to Steve Winberg for helping me out upon my arrival in Georgia and good luck at Wimbeldon Hee Hee.

Where I'm at in life right now

Well I'll start with having been in the Air Force for nine years I'm getting out for a job with the U.S. Border Patrol and ready to leave for the academy some time in October, with news of where I'll be living arriving in mid September. It took about eight months to get through the border patrol hiring process but worked to my advantage due to the fact I'm leaving the military on the 28th of September. They are still hiring if anyone cares to find out about it. My parents are getting ready to retire to Ocala Florida in August, I cant see them leaving Panama but I guess we'll have to see. We know how hard it is to leave Paradise but we all had to leave sometime even though I know we all wish we hadn't.

Diablo Townsite Mischief

A Zonians Memories

Now when I sit down here and think about the Canal Zone and what made it up this is what comes to mind. Balboa bowling alley great times and good burgers, Balboa swimming pool and Joe Cool he worked there and that was his nickname, Balboa theatre where I saw Star Wars when it first came out and played in the crying room several times might have been the only theatre in the world that had that room. Balboa shoe store and my ritual of buying hush puppies as a kid they were my favorite, the trips to Gamboa to play against all the rival townsites in one big good time in archery, kickball, basketball, battleball, indoor hockey and going to the pool there in Gamboa to cool off as well as the burgers at the wives club. The drive in at Balboa and the slurpees they sold there, The Balboa commissary as well as the clothing store above it and the little camera shop right next to it. Vaccicnations there in balboa at that little station by the commissary, the famous scout o ramas held in Balboa every year. Diablo clubhouse was great and good food as well as the theatre in Diablo right next to it. These are some of the things that come to my mind when I ponder being a small child growing up in paradise, I know there is plenty more but I'll leave it at that oh one last one fireworks at Stephens circle man they were great.

Curundu Junior High Days

Hmmm well for starters curundu was a great place a land of many different customs ethnic backgrounds and bullies like you wouldn't believe. My first memory of curundu is a group called the family yes they terrorized people for lunch money etc... but we survived but now that I look back on it I wonder where they all are now? Jail! Hee Hee I mean I use to go all the way around them if I even saw them and so did my fellow classmates and being tardy due to the "Family" didn't cut it with the teachers. Also had some guy take my four colored pen during gym up at the pool and when I saw him with it I told him I wanted it back yeah right! he informed me he had just gotten out of Corozal "you know mental health" and wasn't taking kindly to me asking for my property so I let it go, well I valued not being beat up by some military dependent psycho. Ahhhhhh but these were the stories we never told our parents mostly cause I knew my mom would have got my four colored pen back for me, and if the family would have bothered me I think my mom would have took them hee! hee! thats why I never mentioned these stories to my parents. Lunch time at curundu was great what a big cafetorium we had and it was called cafetorium cause it was both or so I thought. Empanda machines where you payed money and they slowly swung around in a circle mmmm they were great. Gym class was great the old issued property of canal zone schools shorts and for the guys a jockstrap in the famous wire basket. To be continued........