Today is a very special day. It's Jim's 70th birthday and we're celebrating on a cruise ship in Hawaii with a group of 12 other people who came with us.
The Rest of the Story ...
This seems like a good time to tell about Jim, a little about his life, how we met and why I've loved him for over 30 years now.
Although we didn't meet until we were both about 40 years old, we shared similar upbringings. His was a middle class family with 2 kids - one boy, one girl. Mom and Dad were loving parents. Jim claims the title of a momma's boy - as a youngster he spent most of his time with Mom. As a young adult he learned at his Dad's side. "Capt. Jim" was his father and he was a boat handler in the Navy. Jim became an excellent boat captain under his tutelage. They delivered yachts between New Jersey and Florida for several years.
Both parents were in the Navy - that's how they met - and they lived wherever the Navy took them. The first big RV trip was in a little travel trailer. With 2 kids in diapers they traveled cross-country from Patuxent River, MD to San Diego, CA. Then came kindergarten in Key West, Florida, starting grade school in Jacksonville, then off to Iceland!
Such is the life of a Navy brat. But, when the Navy wanted to send his Dad to Vietnam, as a boat driver for the Navy Seals, Jim Sr. said, "No." The attrition rate was just too high for a man with a family. So he quit the Navy and settled in New Jersey where other family members were. Jim spend his formative years living on Long Beach Island - LBI. How Idyllic. LBI was known as where people who could afford it went for their summer vacations. They roll up the sidewalks and turn off the street lights during the winter! Jim had to take a bus across the causeway to the mainland in order to attend High School. I think there was a special comaradery amongst the "Island kids."
After high school, he helped run the family business - a deli/restaurant called the Pumpernickel. It was on the Island so was a summer business. Winters were spent in Forida. His girlfriend, Jo Ellen also worked in the restaurant and they were soon married and had a son, Devon. Years later after they had split up and I was dating Jim, Jo Ellen took me aside and thanked me for making Jim happy. She could see that he and I were better suited than they had been. She ended up coming to our wedding, and we've just been one big, happy famiily ever since.
Both Jim and I were passionate about learning new things, especially technology. I remember the moment I fell in love with him - he invited me to his house for dinner. No, he didn't order pizza - he cooked. I don't remember what he made but I was very impressed that he would invite me over for a home-cooked meal. Then he took me to the computer room and showed me something he'd been playing with - sound. At Jim's computer was the first time I ever heard a computer play sound. I know that sounds mundane now, but in 1993 Windows and multimedia was brand new. It was love at first listen!
And, guess what? He was a scuba diver too! My Mom got me into scuba diving back in 1982, and we belonged to a club called Undersea Adventurers. When Mom and I were booked to go on a dive boat called the Shenandoah to the Bahamas, I asked Jim to go too. And the rest is history!
I ended up hiring him at my computer training center as a Network Administrator and that worked out so well that I married him.
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| We were geeks even then! Our wedding was on a water taxi in Fort Lauderdale, and we wore our propeller beanies! As part of the ceremony we tore off the patches that read "Bride" and "Groom" to reveal embroidered "Husband" and "Wife" |
He helped me grow the business to the point that we were able to sell it and then we decided to sell our house, buy a motorhome and live in it as we traveled the country.
How I got so lucky as to find someone willing to go with the flow and stay by my side, making the most out of whatever life presented, I'll never know, but I am oh-so-glad.
In technology, I am the software person and the teacher. He is the hardware guy and the production engineer. In life I am the big picture decision maker and he is the implementer. I say, let's live in an RV and travel the country, he makes it happen. I say let's start a YouTube channel and he makes it happen. I come up with the content and he makes it look good.
I don't know how any couple could have a better partnership than we do. We'll each have ocassional suggestions for the other, but mostly we leave each other alone to work our magic, knowing that when it comes together, we'll both be happy with the result.
Check out the photo album "The Rest of the Story" for more photos and story about Chris and Jim.
