For me life started July 29th 1953. Birthplace Camp Polk, La, dad was in the army. Don’t remember much because I was pretty young then. I was 5 years old in kindergarten when I realized I couldn’t tell colors. I very vividly remember the teacher shaking me because I refused to learn my color. That’s probably where my distrust of the public ed system started. Fast forward to 1968 having my fill of paint by number paint sets I joined the Sea Scouts in Portland Or where I learned how to sail in 30ft wood whaling boats. In 1970 I bought my first sail boat. A 19ft wood sloop fractional rig. Sailed it a lot with several 3 day weekends up the Columbia river to Multnomah falls and Rooster Rock and back.
February 1973 I joined the U.S. Coast Guard with the idea of learning to navigate and save money to buy a boat to sail to all the neat places I only read about. I was shook again (by that mean teacher) when I found out I needed normal color vision to be a Quartermaster (navigator). So I spent 3 years as a seaman, and 8 years as a Radioman. I got to see a lot of places I hadn’t read about or even wanted to go to. I left the Coast Guard in 1984 and managed a sailing club in Portland Oregon for a fellow. I taught how to sail while in the Sea Scouts. Duties were to oversee the day to day maintenance/repairs/ ops of 22 keel boat. They ranged from 20 ft to 40 ft. Also taught sailing and coached the Lewis and Clark College sailing team. As a perk could sail any and all during my off time. Most memorable for me was during the start of a 60pluss fleet in an Astoria Oregon race I pulled off a port tack start AND cleared the entire fleet while skippering a Wavelength 24. Needless to say I didn’t try that for the rest of that week.
In 1985 I first got involved with the R/C sailboats. At that time OMYC was sailing 50/800 (aka Marblehead). I got a Kisutch and it showed promise. At that point the club met every month but only sailed about 4 times a year. My interest dropped.
New job path from "dock rat" to appliance repair tech/bought a house/got married/ had kids took me into different priorities and away from playing with big and small toys.
Jump to 2009 – Time to play again. Re-up with Oregon Model Yacht Club and hear I am!!
Latest project is building of a Lintel. Rcvd it on Jan 14/12 but was getting ready for the Victoria Frost Bite in Texas so took it home and stashed it in the basement. I finally pulled it out of the bag on 2/24/12. (did someone say procrastinator ?).
A new adventure begins…