Charlene McQuown

bham@hargray.com

Well, I'm finally going to sit here and attempt to write my bio. I felt guilty about getting so much enjoyment from reading all the other bios and not contributing my own. This may take more than one session, as I'm not the best writer in the world. Heck, I'm not even the best writer in this house. I hope I don't put you to sleep!

As you may remember, I had to leave El Centro in the middle of our senior year. That was really hard. I never did feel part of my new school in Florida and missed all my friends back in California terribly. One good thing did come of the move. Since my new school was so close to Cape Canaveral, I got to see the very first U.S. astronaut, Alan Shepard, go up into space. That was something really special I'll remember for the rest of my life. Many of my new classmates were the kids of the scientists at the Cape -- including Werner von Braun's daughter. Needless to say, there was a lot of intimidating brainpower in my new class. There was even a spread about them in Life magazine. After graduation, I attended the University of Florida where I majored in dating with a minor in party -- much to the consternation of my parents. They decided that their education dollars weren't being put to the best use so I had to quit school and find a job.

I was hired by Eastern Air Lines as a flight attendant after they changed their height requirement upward so I could qualify. I was sent to live and work in Boston right out of flight attendant school. What a shock that was! Boston was so old and so different than California and Florida, but after my initial culture shock, I grew to like it and even learned to speak the language. I had quite a pleasant surprise at work one day when I received a call from Ron Burson! He was working for Flying Tigers and was passing through Boston. We got together at the airport coffee shop and I got to do a little catching up on my old classmates. I transferred to Miami and then back to Boston again.

I was living in New Hampshire and commuting to Boston when I met my husband, Pat. He was living in Arizona and visiting some friends in New Hampshire who introduced us. He was an Air Force fighter pilot stationed at Luke AFB in Phoenix. Thank goodness I had free airline passes! After several months of long distance dating and killer long distance bills, he shipped off to Viet Nam where he met my dad for the first time. We got married in Hawaii halfway through his tour in Viet Nam. After he left Southeast Asia, we moved to England where our daughter was born.

After 20 years and moves to Arizona and Virginia (where I worked as a real estate agent), Pat made the decision to get out of the Air Force. We moved to Tennessee where his parents and youngest brother had recently settled. He took a job with Carrier Corporation in McMinnville and we bought a small farm in Manchester. It didn't take long to figure out that wasn't where we wanted to be or the lifestyle we wanted to have. I discovered that I'm a lousy cattle herder -- but that's another story! Pat was offered a job in Saudi Arabia and we lived there for a few years. It was really quite interesting and gave us the opportunity to travel all over the world and meet some really fascinating people. Over half the population there was foreigners, so we socialized with people from all over the world. I even met some Saudi princes and was invited to 2 Saudi weddings. They were quite different than we're used to seeing. I was lucky enough to get a job working for the Army Corps of Engineers while we were living in Riyadh. I really lived the good life while were there. I had a car and a driver at my disposal (women aren't allowed to drive), a full time maid who also cooked and sewed, a nice villa and a fantastic social life.

In spite of the fact that we were really enjoying the life there, we finally decided that we needed to come back to the United States so our daughter would remember she was an American. An additional incentive to return was that we would have had to send her to boarding school if we stayed much longer in Riyadh as the International School there only went to the 8th grade. Pat was offered several positions and opted for a job in Atlanta where we spent the next 15 years which was a record for living in one place for me. I worked as a travel agent for a while, but didn't care for the low pay and long hours.

After a couple of years of college, our daughter, Katie, decided that she really wasn't interested in academics and went off to culinary school in France. When she returned, she spent the next 8 years working at the best restaurants in Atlanta (with one detour to Nantucket) and rose to the position of Executive Chef. However, the long and odd hours and pressure cooker environment of the professional kitchen got to her and she decided to go back to school. She's now attending law school in Atlanta. In spite of the fact that she's a beautiful future lawyer who can cook like a dream, she's still single, so I don't have any grandchildren. She's so independent that I may well never have any!

Pat retired about a year and a half ago and we went out west for a few months where we spent a considerable amount of time visiting with my father in Arizona. We also visited some old friends from Saudi Arabia and some of my family in California. We moved here to Hilton Head Island, South Carolina where we hope to get a sailboat and we're taking up golf. You can't spit without hitting a marina or a golf course here. We no longer have a dog - our last one weighed 180 pounds - but we have a 17-year-old cat Katie rescued while she was in high school. Unfortunately, in addition to dealing with this house being left in deplorable condition by our former tenants, I've been occupied with the death of my father (Mom passed away in 1988 on my birthday) and some serious health problems of Pat's so I haven't really gotten involved in my new community yet. Things are starting to settle down now and Pat's health is very much improved. I hope to be out meeting new folks soon. I plan to get involved in volunteer work and get back to my decorative and faux painting. I'm a crossword puzzle fanatic, too, Jan!

It's seems strange that my life could be summed up in just a few paragraphs, but that's it for the last 40 years. I'm looking forward to the next 40!