Forty years. Hard to believe...
Graduated in '69 from Drew University with a major in Political Science, also took many art courses which were great fun. But my real interest was auto racing, so the law school idea got ditched in favor of a job with a race team / race car importer. I spent the next 3+ years living and breathing the sport, enjoying it all but barely able to afford candy bars for lunch. I started driving some cars owned by a customer and started building up my own car on a shoestring but the finances were a killer, so I switched to selling Porsches, Audis, and Maseratis at a local dealership. This allowed me to upgrade my equipment and I spent the next five years driving road racing and stock cars on all kinds of venues, driving some of the most exotic cars on the planet while slowly realizing that Jackie Stewart really did have more talent than I did.
Along the way Martha and I married in '76, which was my all-time smartest decision. Feeling spunky, I told my boss at the dealership I was interested in his job. He knew how to take care of that little problem and fired me the next day. With the urging of some insightful friends and one supportive wife I started at Merrill Lynch and have been there ever since, helping individuals and local businesses with investments and planning in the Morristown office. It is still fun every day (well, maybe not every single day) and I can't imagine retiring any time soon.
Our daughters are now 21 and 23 years old and do keep us on our toes. Gillian is a soon-to-be senior at Skidmore, majoring in Sociology and is their starting center fielder on the softball team. Aynsley is at Lambertson Truex, a high-end handbag firm in New York; she has an amazing eye for color and design and if a ten thousand dollar bag is on your shopping list she would be happy to help. Both are MLHS graduates. I should note that going as a parent to "back to school" nights a few years ago was eerie; some of the classrooms have not changed one bit.
We moved to Mountain Lakes eight years ago after many years in Madison. If the town looks different to you just compare this to how much the rest of the world has changed, and you might agree with me that it is pretty much the same place it was in 1965. My parents are still in the same house they (we) moved into in '62 on Hillcrest Road but I think they are the only '65 parents still in town.
Race cars got supplanted by sailboats long ago, and I have been active at the Lake Hopatcong Yacht Club, serving in various positions there including being Commodore a couple of years ago. I race pretty much every weekend except the winter months, and travel around a bit at various regattas in the northeast. Sailboats are quieter than race cars, my fingernails stay cleaner, and the competitive juices still flow.
