Classmates

Tell us about what you've done since High School and post a picture if you would like to.
Please note: this is a public website, viewable by anyone in the world with an internet connection; therefore, use caution when providing information (names, ages, locations) about yourself and your family members (Family Information; Volunteer, Civic, Sports & Travel; and Comments.)
All classmates' photos are being added to this page.  If you see your picture and want to edit or add information, send me an email (go to "Contact Us") and I will give you your user ID and password to allow you to take ownership of your information.

Susan Fitzgerald (Jeffries)

Then Then
Now Now
Marital status: Married
Children: 1
Occupation: Attorney
Comment: 2/19/13  I am still practicing law but we have moved to a house on the water with a boathouse & 50' dock.  No big boat yet.  We travel & come home to pets: a dog & two birds.  Active in my Presbyterian church and learning to draw.  I still have my TR-6 as a hobby.  This year we went to Turkey & Greece, Geo went to Egypt & Saudi Arabia.  Maybe Portugal, Spain & Morocco in the fall.  We enjoy taking more time for ourselves; fewer committee & professional committments.  We look forward to seeing everyone and the latest look at Detroit.  We had such a large class the list of missing and deceased makes me count my blessings.  After 10 years as a tax attorney I have now practiced family law for over 15 years.  It is still fun.
Two years ago I worked with Paul Rentenbach on a family case in Detroit...still no hotels in or near GP other than the dreaded Park Crest.  Are there any new options?  PLEASE.  We just moved into a new house built by classmate Bart Elmer.  It was difficult but the house is wonderful and we liked working with Bart and his crew.  My husband George (25 years next year) is a Presbyterian minister who directs the Chaplaincy service at Stanford Univ. Hospital, Palo Alto., but he will retire next year.  What will that be like?  Maybe I will retire soon too...What will that be like?  Since building the house we have no hobbies but we know a lot about plumbing, electric, windows, etc.  Next year,  we do the landscaping and maybe we get back to gardening for fun, needlepoint, travel (when the dollar comes back).  We read a lot of books and play scrabble.  We look forward to the reunion and seeing everyone who is left.


 
Children's names and ages (optional): Alexis
Spouse: Rev. Dr. C. George Fitzgerald

Lewis Kirchner

Then Then
Comment:  

Susanne King

Then Then
Comment:  

Scott Stirton

Then Then
Now Now
Marital status: Married
Occupation: Retired pathologist
Comment: I retired about four years ago and am happy with that decision.  I keep busy with small home maintenance projects, some volunteering, and with gardening, particularly growing dalhias.  I've also been busy with an O gauge model train layout which started out in the 1950's in Grosse Pointe but came out of its retirement when I retired.  It has kept me occupied for the past four years and now fills a good portion of the basement.  Donna and I have been married 36 years.  We love to travel and probably spend a couple of months a year on the road.  Best Wishes to all.
Spouse: Donna

Lisa Gandelot (Mower)

Then Then
Now Now
Marital status: Married
Children: 2
Occupation: Retired
Comment:  
Number of grandchildren (names optional): Carson age 7
Children's names and ages (optional): Nancy and Michael
Spouse: Jon B. Gandelot, class of 1962 GPHS

Peter Girardin

Then Then
Marital status: Single
Occupation: Assistant Dispatch Manager
Comment: Came out of retirement after years of being Executive Chef for successful restaurants in the Cleveland area. Now working as Assistant Dispatch Manager for Revival's - a resale shop (generating yearly sales of $3 Million) to benefit The Desert Aids Project in Palm Springs, Ca.



Peter died in 2020 from cancer.  He was living in Palm Springs, CA, at the time.

Sue Bradley-Lutz (Bradley)

Then Then
Marital status: Married
Children: 2
Occupation: Retired Physical Therapist
Comment: I am busy sailboat racing, playing tennis, volunteering in a program that provides therapeutic horseback riding for physically and mentally challlenged children and playing bridge.  Part of my responsiblities at the barn includies exercising the horses, so I ride several times a week.  I also baby sit for my Grandson, Campbell when needed. I am sorry to miss everyone this year as we will be in Turkey at that time.  I know a good time will be had by all.  Love, Sue
Number of grandchildren (names optional): Campbell
Children's names and ages (optional): Victoria married to Tom and Daniel who is single

Deborah Davis

Then Then
Now Now
Marital status: Single
Children: 1
Occupation: Retired
Comment: Bravo '63--we have a website!!  Must say 'tho I'm more interested in the new swimming pool than basketballs!



So what has Deborah Davis (a.k.a. Debby) been doing all these years?



Well . . . it took me awhile, a long while, to figure out what I was really looking for.



                      A Story of Me



By my 2nd qtr. at Stanford, I realized that I wasn't looking for more-of-the-same knowledge (i.e., content) that we had/did in high school.  Eventually I figured out that what I really wanted was the Origin of KNOWLEDGE, and also the processes of knowing.



None of you know that in January '63, while sitting in Ms. Shermer's 2nd period Honors Math class (not paying much attention to the discussion of homework), I was suddenly surprised by an image of tall, golden French doors appearing on the inner screen of my mind (didn't even have this kind of vocabulary then!).  While looking at the image, I next experienced a kinesthetic sensation of contraction, a "loss of volume" as I thought of it--a decrease in the spaciousness/expansiveness/enthusiasm I had usually known until that moment.  The image disappeared, and I felt like I had "lost something."



Nothing like this had ever happened to me before, and I didn't know what to make of it, or how to even to begin to understand it.  I was vaguely angry for the next few months, lost interest in calculus as well as the rest of high school, and just waited for graduation and high school to be done with.



About 30 years later, in the early morning hours of the second day after a 2-day Siddha Yoga Meditation Intensive with Sw. Gurumayi Chidvilasananda (the one who joyfully plays with the light of consciousness), I was lying awake in my little bunk bed when a vision had me (i.e., my ego was not the author of this image):



There was a cave . . . with lots of bright light and earthy-gold colored walls.  On the floor of this cave was a luminous pearl-white alligator/crocodile; with one gleaming black eye (it was in profile).  The whole scene/image was motionless.  It just sat there, curving around me, filling my field of vision.  I (ahamkara , literally, "I-maker" = ego) asked a question, "I wonder if the alligator's teeth are also black?"  Nothing happened: the image didn't change; the alligator didn't open it's mouth (!!!)



Then, there was a consciousness-force that STOPPED my busy-busy whirling mind.  And the contracted consciousness that is ego was released.  There was calmness, utter calmness (samadhi ).  



Then another question was asked (by anahamvadin, "not-I-speaking"):  "Is there water in this cave?" and after this question, my sensory equipment kicked into gear!  My eyes searched the cave; no water could be seen.  Ears listened; none of the sounds of water, not even the littlest sloshings could be heard.  Nose smelled, tongue tasted--there were no such hints of water.  The skin of my forearms and face felt not the touch of moisture.  After all this activity of not finding water, I then experienced the tremendous PRESENCE OF 'WATER'.



When it wanted to, the vision left.



What we usually call images are either memories or concepts; and most of our imagining these days is fantasy--where the image or sequence of images has a subject, or is directed by a subject (= ego).  The true image, the pure image, is not so directed and is not borrowed.  It is non-egoic and must be created.  



"Dismemberment" (the technical term), each sense reading and sensitizing the image, is a unique feature of deep meditation.  The act of imagining the pure image relies mostly on the inherent capacity for, and embodied techniques of, meditation: concentration, guided and directed will, the closing of external and other internal worlds.  It is only through the creation of a pure image in meditation that sensation flows in this manner through the meditator.  And the result of this process is that old habits of mind, which had previously organized sensation, are released/dissolved, and a new, larger (re)organization takes their place.  The capacity/measure of one's experience increases (is "opened up," widened; e.g., "opening the heart") as, simultaneously, the experience enlarges this measure: the capacity of the body enlarges to contain larger doses of sensation (something like going from "narrow band" to "broad band"!!), larger/greater unities--one's ontologic horizon enlarges (as the epistemologists would put it).



The processes of women's and men's consciousness-raising is kin to these mystical methods.  They arise from the inherent human capacity for contemplation-meditation: for example, women in groups, sharing their intelligence, knowledge, and experiences of patriarchal oppression, sooner or later experience "the click."  After this insight-experience, they are desensitized to their former conditionings/unities and attachments (the cultural sludge), and are newly sensitized to fresh sensations.  The next "click" will not require as much work or take as long.  The embodied soul, the ensemble of knowing-feeling-flesh, is eager for such development; the body likes the centered feeling of greater/deeper freedom, the "taste" of liberation.



So.  What else happened in those 30 years?  My parents moved to Florida in the early 70s.  My father died very suddenly (heart attack) in 1976.  My daughter, Deborah Zoe Davis was born in 1982 (I didn't marry).  My brother, Zoe, and I took care of my mother as she died from cancer and chemotherapy in 1985.  Zoe and I lived in the D.C. Metro Area for awhile as I worked at various engineering firms (technical editing/writing/DOD proposals).  I wandered back to Michigan and MSU for an MA in Child Development and ABD in Human Development, while Zoe went to school in E. Lansing.  Then we headed west for California, but only made it as far as Phoenix--for 7 years.  Zoe's engaged and still in Phoenix; and I've gone adventuring to S. Korea.
Children's names and ages (optional): Zoe, 30

Bud Jacobs

Then Then
Marital status: Married
Children: 2
Occupation: Educator
Comment:
California has been home for over 40 years, and it continues to provide a rich and exciting life.  I graduated from UC Berkeley and got my MA from UCLA, so I owe my education to the Golden State.  My wife and I met at CAL and we just celebrated our 40th anniversary, so I owe my heart to California.  My children grew up in Pacific Palisades and both graduated from CAL, so I am deeply indebted to California for the success of my two precious daughters and now two precious grandchildren.   Two years ago, my career as a high school principal and school district administrator ended in the second largest school district in America (LAUSD) so I owe a great deal of professional success to LA.  And now, as the executive didrectors of a non-profit working with at-risk youth in urban schools, I reside in the largest talent agency in America (CAA), so I can finish my life of work in the glitter of Hollywood.  With the beaches and the mountains and those wonderful endless summers, "it's all good!"
Number of grandchildren (names optional): Rebecca and Miles
Children's names and ages (optional): Erica (36) and Megan (33)
Spouse: Cathe

Pierre (Pete) Zaranek

Then Then
Now Now
Marital status: Married
Children: 3
Occupation: Computer Consultant - Retired
Number of grandchildren (names optional): Trent, Ty, Trace, Skylar, Alex, Jake
Children's names and ages (optional): David (38), Todd (35), Tedd (35) (Identical Twins)
Spouse: Gail