Wow! After reading some of the bio's of many of my classmates, I certainly was impressed and became very humbled to write of my basically indistinguishable but very happy and simple life.

As many of you know, Bill Elias and I have really been together since ninth grade at Luther Burbank in 1952. After I graduated and being the traditional Italian daughter of very strict Italian parents, it was understood that I would work until I got married. Both my sisters and I were never encouraged to go on to college even though we all had the grades to do so, but that was the way it was. I went to work at the Community Bank in Burbank and Bill went to work with his Dad at Lockheed Missiles in Van Nuys. We both saved our money to get married and on August 18, 1957, we were married at the Little White Chapel in Burbank. Marcia Barrera and Barbara Dingman(1955 classmates) were among my attendants and Dick and Jim Shrake (also Burroughs classmates) were among Bill's attendants. I faintly remember that Joan Samuelsen and Richard Myers( also classmates) were married just before us or right after us at the Chapel. We settled in a small house on Fairview Street that belonged to Bill's sister. For almost two years, we worked and did all the fun things young married couples did in those days. On July 4, 1959, we started our family with the birth of our son, Kenneth. One of the very low points of our life together was the birth and death of our second son, Stephen on December 31, 1961. I had a severe pregnancy complication and he was born prematurely at eight months, in these days of neo-natal care, they might have saved him. However, we rejoiced with the birth of our son Daniel who was born on February 22, 1963 and then on May 5, 1967 we got our little girl, Sherry. As you can see, we had all our children on some holiday or another.

In 1964, Lockheed Missiles was moving to Sunnyvale and because Bill and I didn't want to move, we accepted a small severance pay. With that small sum, we bought our first house on Maple St. near Luther. I believe Dan Cassidy was raising his family on the next street, Pass Ave. In December of 64, Bill's former boss went to Jet Propulsion in Pasadena and asked Bill to join him there and Bill accepted. It was important to us to stay in Burbank and raise our children in the same town and go to the same schools as we did. Our parents and some of our siblings were still here. My sister and I used to trade baby-sitting and we were able to help both sets of parents in their old age until their deaths. I know there are some that would consider this all boring staying in the same town that we were raised in but it was what we wanted. All three children went to Mingay, Luther and Burroughs. We both stayed busy with the kids growing up, sport leagues, Cubs, Girl Scouts, Indian Guides, PTA and all the other activities parents did.

In 1973, we bought the house across the street that was double in size to our old one on Maple so we moved. It was neat because we got our bigger place and the kids didn't have to change schools and from lst grade through 9th grade, they walked to school. Big move, huh? There were some things we wanted to do to remodel and redecorate, so I decided a part-time job was in order. I got a job 6-10 pm at an aircraft fasteners company in Burbank as an inventory control clerk and then later as a computer clerk. So we wouldn't need a baby-sitter, Bill would watch them when he got home at 5 and I would leave for my job. I was only going to work to do the few things we wanted around the house. In the meantime, I saw an ad for a ESL aide at Luther Burbank for 3 hours in the morning. I really wanted to do that and thought I would love the teaching part, I tested for the position and they accepted me and so now I had two part-time jobs. Luther was fun and I loved it, however after working with some of the new young teachers, I regretted not getting a teaching degree because I could teach circles around most of them especially the substitutes. I had my own group that I took to the library and made lesson plans, graded and was given the freedom to do my own thing with them. Those of you who went to Luther might remember Alice Bennett, a really tough English teacher. She was still there in 1973 and she wanted me to call her Alice but I just couldn't, some of that old respect we had for teachers was still with me. I stayed at Luther for 16 years and in Dec. 1989, I retired. Sherry was getting married in Jan, 1990 and I wanted to have the time free to plan her wedding and then frankly, I burned out. I continued with the inventory clerk job but went to afternoons when I left Luther and retired from there in 1999 after 26 years. I made many life-long friendships from that job and still do many social things with them. I was really excited to retire because I was offered a part-time job (2 full days per week) at a children's bookstore in Montrose, Once Upon A Time. All my life, I have read, read, read. I especially love American historical novels but really read any genre. I probably read 2-3 books a month. I LOVED this job, I was in my element of books and in the short time I was there, I learned so much about children's literature. I think I bought more than I earned every week. Again, the gals I worked with have become life-long friends.

I was inconsolable when I had to leave that job late summer of 2001. My knee was giving me so much pain and it was becoming harder and harder to stand and finally the doctor said after everything else failed to stop the pain, I needed to have the knee replacement. That started the spiral of surgeries; from Oct. 2001 to the present, I have had 6 surgeries; three on the right knee and three on the left foot and ankle. I still don't have good mobility even after months of PT and many visits to different doctors have agreed that I'm as good as I'm going to get so it has curtailed our traveling much to my regret. I walk as much as I can and 2 to 3 times per week I go to the Burbank Y for water therapy.

Once the kids were out on their own, Bill and I did alot of traveling around the good old USA. I love the Revolutionary and Civil War history and we did alot of traveling to those historic sites, Bill's always been a good sport and has taken me any where I wanted to visit even if it wasn't especially appealing to him. We've been to Gettysburg, Williamsburg, Monticello, Mount Vernon, Vicksburg, Sihoh, Washington DC, Richmond. We've always loved music and had some fun days visiting New Orleans, Memphis and Nashville. We've traveled Canada both Eastern and Western coasts. We had our first cruise to the Mexico Riviera for our 25th anniversary and have taken a cruise very 5 years for our anniversary; Western Caribbean, Fall Foliage Canada and East Coast, Panama, and Alaska. Hopefully, we plan a 15 day Hawaii cruise for our 50th in 2007. Since I lost alot of my mobility, we have had to cancel three trips because I just couldn't do it; San Antonio to see the Alamo and Branson; Florida and Charleston to see where the Civil War started; and a fall foliage week in Woodstock, Vermont. Maybe someday, we can re-schedule.

Bill finally retired in December of 2004 after 40 years and although we have had to put off our retirement traveling, he is keeping busy doing things around the house and working with his dogs. We have a Golden, 4 yr old Carrie that is in the Pat Program at Huntington Memorial Hospital in Pasadena. They volunteer 3-4 hours every Sat. visiting patients and now we also have a 1 yr. Yellow Lab that he is grooming to pass the Delta tests to also become a service animal and then he'll do two days a week. In Feb. 2004, Bill retired from the Burbank Police Reserves as a Lieutenant after serving almost 10,000 hours and 24 years. He is such a good and unselfish person and has always volunteered at one thing or another.

Our children have given us three wonderful grandchildren, Julie, 13, Tyler 10 and Carly 7. As all of you grandparents out there know, they are the joy of our lives and what makes it even better, we can see them often. Julie and our daughter Sherry live in Woodland Hills, Tyler and Carly and our son Dan live in Simi Valley. Our older son Ken lives in Canoga Park but no children of his own but we do have an adult step-granddaughter, Tanya. Again, people have asked since Bill retired, "where are you going to move" and we think and think about it but always come back to "why move, our house is fixed up the way we want it and the taxes are low, all our friends and family are around here, we love the city services including the medical community so until something comes up to change our minds, we're here to stay. The only thing that annoys us is the traffic but it doesn't seem to be much better anywhere else.

Well, I hope I didn't bore you with this uneventful saga of what Esther has been up to the last 50 years. I haven't seen the whole world, I don't have any degrees after my name, I haven't done anything newsworthy but I am blessed with a loving husband that has taken care of me so lovingly especially the last few years with all the surgeries and that I love just as much as I did in Junior High, three wonderful children that are always there to help Mom and Dad and three fabulous grandchildren that bring such joy to our lives and many, many life-long friends so I do have a wonderful and blessed life. Bill and I always laugh that our bodies may not be the same (I still see him with a full head of hair and he sees me at 120 lbs) but our minds are still that of a 17-18 yr old from Burroughs. Some people ask what has kept our marriage together, 48 yrs in August, and I always say, Bill can still make me laugh which we do often and especially at ourselves.

I hope to see you all at reunion and catch up with as many classmates as I can get around to visit.