Jerry Boone (DeSales class of ’64) and I married in 1971. (Boone is a journalist and car nut.) I also completed my BA in history at UB that year. Our son, Jared, 33, married a wonderful young lady named Jennifer Marx last September. He is a software engineer in a company developing Internet telephone hardware. He is also a licensed pilot and loves to cook. Our daughter, Janne (Jan), 30, works for the State of Oregon as an analyst in Health Policy, but has been accepted for the Nutritional Epidemiology doctoral program at the University of North Carolina for the fall of 2005. She enjoys distance running and rock and mountain climbing. She hates to cook.

Boone started racing sports cars at 30. Most of our friends are racers. Car racing permeates our lives. Even my job of 22 years came through racing. I work part-time for what is now the finest independent auto repair shop in the Northwest as bookkeeper, human resources department, and ad and photography staff. For ten years I did a weekly column called "Portland in Years Past," in The Oregonian newspaper, (for which Boone is a columnist), and currently do freelance photography for Stock Car Racing magazine. Boone is a freelance writer for Stock Car and sometimes ESPN.com and also shoots.

Working part-time has allowed me to volunteer over the years at such diverse things as hauling tons of food for a food bank, serving on the Solid Waste Advisory Committee for the City of Portland (talking trash!), and teaching Art Literacy in local elementary schools. Currently, I'm serving on the Advisory Board for the Automotive Service and Repair Technology Program at Portland Community College and as a SMART (Start Making a Reader Today) volunteer at Aloha Park Elementary School. I’m also an Oregon State University Certified Master Recycler. Hobbies include reading, traveling, photography, and kayaking.

2010 Update:  Boone and I are still married, 40 years next January. He took a buyout from The Oregonian two and a half years ago. I retired last August.

Our son, Jared, 38, is now combining his love for both programming and music by designing and improving musical toys. (See Paper Jamz at your local Walgreens.) He just raced for the first time in July in a Chumpcar enduro in Spokane and did very well. His wife, Jenny, just completed her Masters at the University of Oregon in Landscape Architecture. They live about half an hour away from us.

Our daughter, Janne, 35, finished her PhD in Nutritional Epidemiology at the University of North Carolina Chapel Hill last year and presented us with our first grandchild, Sam, last November. She and her husband, Chris, hope to be back in Oregon by the end of the year. She does obesity research.

Boone finally gave up racing, selling the last of probably a half dozen different race cars last year. He's now restoring a 60s Lotus Europa and somehow wound up as crew chief for a local businessman who thinks endurance racing a stock car is a good idea. The 12-hour enduro in Portland last fall had a steep learning curve. At the 25 Hours of Thunderhill (Northern California) last December the car lasted about 25 laps through no fault of the team's. Boone's story about the two races was featured in the May issue of Circle Track magazine. The cover photo and the 13 other photos with the story were mine. They billed me as "Veteran Photographer June Boone," which was almost better than getting paid for the photos. This is the only national freelance gig we've had since Stock Car Racing magazine went under about three years ago. Perhaps you've noticed that print journalism is in big trouble. There are a lot of journalists out of work. We've been very lucky. Boone does have a gig writing about a story a week for a website: www.popularrestorations.com

It was fun while it lasted. I'm not a race fan, but going to NASCAR Cup races as a photographer for the magazine in places like Daytona, (Florida in Feburary!) Charlotte, Texas Motor Speedway, and Infineon (north of San Francisco), as well as having access most stock car fans would kill for was a blast. I also loved seeing my photos in a national magazine and getting paid for it. I gotta admit I miss it some.

We bought a 28-foot motorhome last summer and in January went south for seven weeks. Museums, zoos, funky little towns, beaches, wild life sanctuaries, state parks, restaurants, shops, tide pools, historic sites -- we did it all. We also weathered four major storms in our tin can and two earthquakes. Using the Miata we'd towed on a trailer behind our rig we rarely spent a day in camp. It was a blast. Next time we will go for longer (we had to get home in time for a race…). We are volunteers with Habitat for Humanity here and plan to work with Habitat on our next motorhome voyage, perhaps in Apache Junction AZ . They will be starting a new project there in January. Building with Habitat is fun and it would give us something useful to do when we go south instead of simply enjoying ourselves like last time.

I just got back from a trip to WNY and Nova Scotia where I was the photographer for my niece's wedding. We're thinking about trying to catch the space shuttle launch November 1st with friends. I'm still addicted to reading novels and garden (you can take the girl off the farm but…). We kayak, walk, or go to the gym several times a week and bowl with friends most Fridays. We're getting older but we have to keep moving. So far so good. We love being retired although it seems like we keep awfully busy. It's a good life.

2015 Update:  Married: Jerry Boone, January 1971, 40 + years in Journalism

Graduated: SUNY at Buffalo, BA in History June 1971

Son: Jared, born July, 1972, B.S. Computer Science, wife, Jenny Marx

Daughter: Janne (Jan) born June 1975, B.S. Biology, Masters in Public Health, Phd. Nutritional Epidemiology, husband, Chris Heinonen

Grandchildren: Sam Heinonen (Nov. 2009), and Max Heinonen (March 2012) The most handsome, intelligent and charming boys on the face of the earth.

We’re both retired. Boone took a buyout at 61 from The Oregonian at the end of 2007. I retired shortly after I hit 62. We’ve never looked back.

We freelanced for a while. Traveling to cover car racing was fun while it lasted. Boone still does features and play reviews occasionally for The Oregonian when we’re in Oregon.

We have had some sort of camper or motorhome for almost 40 years to tow Boone’s racecars and camp at the track weekends, but once we retired we decided to take our rig and go south for the winter. This is our sixth year spent in a motor home in the Southwest. Our current location for five months is Mesa, AZ where we hike, kayak, take side trips to explore Arizona and spend the occasional Happy Hour with friends. We also enjoy the very active live theater and numerous festivals in the area.

Boone has become a very talented wood carver after being introduced to the hobby in 2013. I am in the park chorus practicing four hours a week for concerts in March and am learning to play the guitar. We’ve been to Mexico, Japan, England, Belgium and Italy and are planning a trip in conjunction with the Class Reunion to Scotland.

When in Oregon there is always work around the house. Boone quit racing about five years ago and began restoring a Lotus Europa. It’s almost done. I grow vegetables and flowers on a small suburban lot. There’s always a book or two somewhere I’m in the middle of, but most of all there are our grandsons. At least two mornings a week are spent with the boys; squirt gun fights, hide and seek, trips to the park, the zoo, the children’s museum, digging in the dirt. Life is so much fun! Soon they will be too old to have time for me but for now I love every minute. Life is good.

P.S. I call my husband Boone because some 30 some odd years ago he worked at the Coos Bay World as an editor. The two other editors were also named Jerry. He became Boone because asking for Jerry didn’t work too well.