Where are you now, Cathi Goolsbee? I am not sure that I spelled either of her names right. When I knew her she from deep in the heart of Texas. The year after I got out of the Navy I lived in Oakland, CA and worked with Young Life at Skyline High School. The opportunity came for me to work at Young Lifes’ Woodleaf for six weeks in the summer of 1980. I had dropped out of school and was just living on my GI Bill and savings, when I got the call to come be the gardener at Woodleaf for the first six weeks of the summer. On May 31 Stephanie Tobosa, someone else and I all drove up to Woodleaf to begin our summer service. While summer staff was there for six weeks we had work crew that was there for three weeks. All the summer staff had to be at least 2 years out of high school and work crew were juniors or seniors in high school.

As the gardener I had a person from work crew who worked with me, she was called the water girl. Basically she helped with all the watering and such that we had to do. We had something like six big marigold beds, 20 or 30 rose bushes, a football field and numerous lawns that we were responsible for. Cathi came with a group of work crew from Texas, and everytime I hear Willie Nelson sing Mamas’ Don’t Let Your Babies Grow up to be Cowboys I think of them. Cathi was a real help and remember she did it all while having to take multiple meds multiple times a day. She was a good friend and we stayed in touch for a little while and then as invariably happens you just lose touch. I have never forgotten her or her smile from those three weeks we worked together. Cathi, if you are out there drop me a email at chainreader@hotmail.com

Where are you now, Lamar Allen?

Actually to get that picture you see I found Lamar, he is a pastor at Calvary Baptist in Los Gatos, CA.  The reason I was looking for Lamar is that he is the first person, other than my parents, that I can remember influencing me to follow after Christ.  Lamar was the youth pastor at Berean Baptist Church in Eugene, OR.  He was a big influence in many different ways.  I remember spending time with he and his family, and learning much from him.  When I was headed down a bad path he helped me find my way back to the straight and narrow.  It looks like what he is doing now is helping even more people now.  Thanks Lamar, Nancy, Brenda, Beth and Bryan.

Where are you now, Pat Vann?

When you move around a lot you have a lot of best friends that you either have to leave and never see again or for some reason they leave your life and never see again.

We moved to Eugene, Oregon in July of 1972 from Big Sur, California after a couple of Sundays we settled on Berean Baptist Church at 12th and Chambers.  I got involved in the high school youth group and one of my best friends in the group was Pat Vann.  I don’t remember if we did anything together outside of group, but when we were in the group we were always together.  Then his family moved to Reno during our junior year and I have never heard from  him or of him since.  Pat, if you are reading this leave a comment.

Where are you now?

Well ever since I got back from my walk this morning I have trying to put a picture in this post but no matter how I try to do it I can’t make it work.  Do you hear that Steve?  The picture is of my parents and Leonard and Ivy Crocker.  What I would like to do every Friday is ask where someone I used to know is and see if anyone knows.  This Friday I am doing something different.  Leonard and Ivy are the only people that I know that have always been in the same place.  Others may be but I don’t know where they are anymore.  Leonard and Ivy live in Long Beach, CA and have lived in the same house ever since I was born, for those of you not good at math, that is over 50 years.  My parents have moved sometimes and I didn’t know where they had moved to, but the Crockers have always been in the same house.  I remember going to their house many times and asking Leonard to pass me a roll and he would always pick it up and toss it to me.  They were the first people I knew who have a water cooler in their house, in the late 60′s.  They had a above ground pool we would swim in.  Their son, Don, is just a few months older than I am, so we used to hang out together when we lived in La Palma, CA.   I remember driving from Portland to Long Beach once with a friend, cause she had never been to Disneyland and camping in her Monte Carlo.  The first real shower and such came when we stopped at Leonard and Ivys’.  They were very welcoming then and I think they would be today.  I liked spending time with them and would like to introduce them to family.  Although the Ruth Ann and the boys met them for a few moments at my sisters’ house a few years.  Thank Leonard and Ivy for always being in the same place.