Before & Beyond Divorce

As a young girl in high school, I suppose I was very square.  I was very much a book worm.  Grades did not come easy; therefore, I spent most of my time in my school books, and still did not make the top grades.

The most important book I had to study was my Bible.  I enrolled in every bible correspondence course that I could hear of and kept the mail man busy delivering and picking up my mail.  My parents operated a poultry farm for a very small check each week.  Money was very scarce, at age 13 , I began working part-time doing just anything that paid just a little.

I recall one job that paid $3.00 per day.  The job was in a very small town about 15 miles away from home, my father would carry me to work in the mornings and pick me up in the afternoons, I did not see at this time what a hardship this put on my father, he was driving 60 miles a day, and of course, the cost of gas cost him money even back then.  I was very careful in spending my money on needful things such as school supplies and of course, postage stamps.  I even saved my lunch money for spending money instead of food.  This didn’t seem to hurt me because I was a very healthy child. Weighing at least 175 at age 15.

Due to my being a book worm and as large as one side of the house I was not very popular at school.  It seemed that I was always well liked, but just never really fit in with any of the ganges, especially where any boys were around.  I thought boys were dirty!  This thought may have come from my older sisters marrying at the age of 15 and 16.  My brother also married young, so I really did not even know him as a boy.  The only time I was popular with the boys were when term papers were due.  I enjoyed writing term papers and believe you me, I wrote several.

Since our families money was so short I could not even attend any ball games.  I got in with the coach and got the job of running the clock; therefore, I didn’t have to pay to get into the games.  This was my only form of recreation after I became too big to play ball.  (We couldn’t get suits large enough and I was embarrassed when co-players called me big mama.

My church was always my recreation!  I recall walking about 3 miles one way to church.  Then my father had to have a small tractor to plow the farm, so since we did not have a car - I learned to drive the tractor and drove the tractor to church for quite sometimes.  I began teaching Sunday school about the age of 16 and was very devout.  I even surrendered my life to Christ as a missionary nurse.

After graduation from high school, I entered nursing school on a scholarship; however, after a short time I had to have emergency surgery, I was out of school for about 6 weeks.  Due to my being a book worm, when I returned to school and found myself so for behind my class I could not stand the pressure- studding night and day to catch up - after about 3 weeks, at age 18, my nerves snapped.  I had a nervous breakdown!  This was the end of my life!

After about 6 months of anguish, I realized I must get on with my life.  The big question was:  “why did God call me to be a missionary nurse and then not allow me to go to nursing school?.

Since I had worked in my high school office for 3 years prior to graduation as a secretary, I thought this might be the way for me to go.  I might be able to get some type job as a secretary and just maybe someway I could go back to school.  I went to live with a dear aunt and did find a job within one week.

After about one year things were looking up for me, I had a good job, I had a new car, I was still very active in church, and was going to school at night.  Since I couldn’t be a nurse, what could I do with myself  ?

My work began to require some accounting that I knew nothing of, so why not take some college courses in accounting?  Of course as usual, I was not satisfied with just a few classes, I was able to again get a scholarship so here goes - full time student plus working a full time job, life became very dull.

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