Life Flies By Faster Than You Think

Bebe’s Biography

Did I hear him right? The newspaper publisher sitting across from me was trying to lure me away from my current job. “I’d like you to come and work for me,” he said.

I was the editor of a small-town weekly newspaper in the heart of a North Carolina town that you would miss if you blinked your eyes passing through. The publisher of a competing paper was offering me a job.

The reason?

I had exposed a corruption scheme that got the police chief fired, and I had interviewed the owner of a new massage parlor on the outskirts of town. I don’t know which story was the bigger draw. Featured with the massage parlor story was a photo I had snapped of the curvy woman in charge, perched on an exercise bike, smiling sexily.

People in a small southern town in the seventies were as shocked by a massage parlor as they might have been had they seen Lady Godiva riding through town naked on a horse. But the police chief scandal was big news, too.

And papers were selling out!

But I didn’t accept the publisher’s offer. I knew deep down I wouldn’t be in the newspaper business long. There was something that disturbed me about exposing a scandal that got my friend the police chief fired, and I felt bad about the massage parlor owners being run out of town.

Although I had majored in Journalism with a double major in English Literature at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, newspaper work didn’t seem to be my cup of tea. I felt it led to a callous attitude, because I was beginning to think more about next week’s headlines than about compassion. I was also getting a little restless, being a young, single woman in a very small town.

I seized an opportunity to leave the business when my roommate, who had always dreamed of being a flight attendant, talked me into going with her to apply for an airline job. I got the job and she didn’t, which shows life isn’t always fair; a lesson I’ve learned many times over.

I left the newspaper and my boyfriend to work as a flight attendant, although my boyfriend was the best looking, smartest, nicest guy I knew. But the relationship looked like a dead end, because he said he could never marry me since I was a Christian girl. He didn’t believe in God.

“I can’t deny my beliefs,” I told him, as stubborn then as I am now. So I moved from North Carolina to New Jersey to start my new life without him.

Only I didn’t leave him behind for long. Moving away must have made my stock go up in his estimation, because he decided we should marry, after all. Does it work out like that a lot? You leave, and you suddenly become more irresistible?

My new husband and I, seeking adventure, examined a map of the United States and randomly, like a roll of the dice, selected Chicago. He landed a job there, I got a transfer with the airline, and we pooled our resources to buy a condo in the city close to Lake Michigan, which turned out to be a super real estate investment.

I quit flying when I started having babies, and stopped having babies when I got to three. By this time, we had moved to North Carolina, then on to Georgia, and I was a full-time Mom.

But the itch to write, the same itch that had led me to Journalism, never died. I did a little freelancing, mostly collecting rejection slips, although a few magazines published my work. I’ve forgotten how many books I wrote that ended up in a basement box or a dumpster.

My husband, ever supportive, talked me into starting my own publishing company, so I did, and self-published three books, which led to speaking engagements, some disappointments, and some successes.

When my youngest was a senior in high school, I embarked on a different career. I landed a job as the thrift store manager at a local nonprofit, and this is where I discovered a new skill; the ability to run a business. The store income went from $180,000 a year to $1.3 million a year, the charity moved to a larger building, and I was promoted to director. We managed to see 125 families a day, helping them with food, clothes, and financial assistance. Sometimes we were even able to give away a car to a family trying desperately to make it, but without the necessary transportation.

During those years, my children were busy working, getting married and starting their own families, and now I have 12 grandchildren. One is Native American, two are adopted from foster care, one is with us through a foster/guardianship, one is autistic, one is studying to be a veterinarian, another is studying to be in film production, two are talented artists, and all 12 are beautiful and wonderful.

During this pandemic, I haven’t seen much of them, but I created a prayer board that hangs on the wall. Their pictures are on it, along with my prayers for them. I don’t believe any prayer sent out into the universe returns to us void, even if we don’t always get the answer we want.

These days, I take care of my 101-year-old mother, who lives with me and the man I married 43 years ago. He is still the best looking, smartest, nicest guy I know.

I spend as much time outside as I can, mostly hiking and kayaking, and when I’m not outside or caregiving or working around the house, I’m usually reading or writing.

If somebody asked me for philosophical thoughts about living your best life, I would say:

Let go of the past, forgiving yourself and others. I’ve done (and still do) a lot that needs forgiving, so I hope to return the favor.

Every day is an opportunity for a new start.

Enjoy the moment, since it’s all we’re assured of.

Life flies by faster than you think.

Jesus is remarkable. Learn more about him.

Next to love, a sense of humor is high on my list of desired characteristics.

Love is the most important thing in the universe. It is the only thing that has the power to heal the world.

That’s my biography in a nutshell. Pretty unremarkable, but I wouldn’t change it.