Picking Up The Leftover Pieces

I left off posting about my life back in October of 2017. That post was titled, "An End to Something". I didn't mean to make it sound so final. It was the end of several things, but certainly not the end of me.

Much changed, but some things continued.

We were still doing family things and the kids had continued in their own pursuits. However, they were little kids anymore, so changes were coming there as well.

In 1996, I moved up to  Manager of Darryl's Little League team. We were still the Phillies, defending our league championship from the year before and Darryl was leading again in most offensive and defensive statistics. We repeated as League Champions again, but finished second in the playoffs.

It was Darryl's last year in true Little League. He was too old for the 8 to 12 year olds and he moved up to the Junior
League, playing for a team sponsored by Wilmington Trust.
He was named to the All Star Team again and played in the outfield. It was his next to last year of organized ball. He was tired of the grind after more than a half-dozen seasons.

It was my last years as a manager. I had managed one more year in the minors without Darryl on the team.  The next year I went over as a bench couch in the Junior League on his team, but I wasn't enjoying it either. I was struggling with my eyesight and it scared me to shag balls in the outfield. I could no longer pick up the flight path.

Noelle was doing a lot of art by now.  She had paintings selected two years in a row for displaying in the Young Brandywine Artist exhibits.

She also had joined SADD (Students against Drunk Driving). Noelle is the girl with her back against the Drunk Jack o'Lantern in this photo.

She was in Honors Classes and in 1997 she would be an exchange student living with a family in Torgua, East Germany.

We had that families daughter here staying with us. Her name was Katja Noch. She gave us interesting perspectives, having grown up mostly under Communist rule. Her parent's careers had

been dictated by the regime. For instance, her mother had been an English teacher forced to become a Russian teacher.  The photo on the right is of Katja while she was here with us.

She and Noelle kept in touch for a number of years, but the last I heard of Katja she was working for the United Nations.

Darryl, meanwhile had joined the ROTC at his high school, Mt. Pleasant. He is pictured on the left.

Laurel was continuing to ride at gateway Stables and participate in horse shows, where she won a

number of First Place ribbons. In school she was involved with the music programs and playing parts in shows.  She was a member of the Green Knights Chorus, who competed in a festival in Florida, and won. They also got to tour and appear in the Epcot Center. (Laurel is in the top row on the extreme left.)

Laurel was also in Honors Classes.

She graduated in 1996. Mt. Pleasant was being renovated that year, so her classes were held in the former Claymont High School. The kids were not happy about this, they wanted to graduate at Mount Pleasant. The kids called it Claymount..

If the family was seeing some changes, where I felt them the most was at work.