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< Back Marylou's Story Marylou Davis (76) talks with her granddaughter, Abigail Horan (21) about the pivotal moments in her life which sculpted the path to the life she has today. In the interview, Marylou discusses how moving from Florida back to Massachusetts where she originally lived was a tough decision, but ultimately worked out in the end because of the relationships she fostered once arriving back. 00:00 / 03:24 00:00 / 03:24 Well I think the most pivotal point in my life is when I basically had to make a big decision because of being now a widow. My husband passed away. He died young at 57. And I was living away from my hometown we had moved to Florida and my decision was did I want to come back to Massachusetts because this is where I had friends I had a family I have two daughters one in Marco which is where we lived in Florida and one in Massachusetts my daughter who was having grandchildren who were living in Boston moved back to the area where we are from that is the decision I had to make. When she was coming back I knew that I wanted to go back home. That was always my thing ya know I wanted to know my grandchildren and be able to have a connection with them we lived there for nine years What are some of the important lessons you learned from this big decision to move home? Well, the lesson that I learned is that I could live on my own ya know because you always think about this part of your life are you going to be able to live on your own I had to find an apartment, I had to find a job I had to work and you know I had to make a new life for myself. Even though I did have friends you know but I did reconnect with people too and that was a big turning point in my life you know I was all set to have this one apartment it was going to be in Dartmouth but my mother in law was still living and I had to take her to the doctors one day we went to her doctor her doctor lived in this beautiful mansion of a house in New Bedford Mass and he knew me he knew the family he knew the situation after he examined my mother in law he said to me well Marylou you have a job and I said no I do not have a job I’m looking for a job he said well do you have an apartment I said well I do have an apartment that's going to be in Dartmouth he said well I have an apartment upstairs and I would really like you to look at it I was in Dartmouth I lived in Dartmouth for 20 years So I was thinking oh I don't know if I could live in the city you know but after we got done he said take the key go upstairs and look at the apartment So I take the key, I go upstairs I look at the apartment I fell in love with it It was a huge apartment I mean it was two bedrooms, high ceiling all freshly painted everything was included, the electric the hear. The doctor his name is David had a brother that I knew was his brother because I worked for him years years ago and he was manager of a store in the city and when I had this apartment I kept saying to myself cause I would see Steven every once in a while at the stores but I hadn't seen him in a long while of course but I said ya know if I ever see him I want to tell him where I live in his brothers apartment and of course, his brother knew that I knew him but so I did see him one time he changed jobs and I went up to him and I told him and low and behold I didn't know that he was going to be my second husband I lived in that apartment for three and a half years. Previous Next

Come listen to Candace’s story about her experience afinding her partner Gary and moving to Peru and living abroad. Through her story, Candace reflects on how living abroad allowed her to break free from her past and go on the adventure she had always wanted when she was little. Candace's Story Come listen to Candace’s story about her experience afinding her partner Gary and moving to Peru and living abroad. Through her story, Candace reflects on how living abroad allowed her to break free from her past and go on the adventure she had always wanted when she was little. Candace's Story 00:00 / 05:48 I was born in Princeton New Jersey in December of 1949. Unfortunately, I was born to very [inaudible] parents. As a child I always hoped that one day things would change. And then I remember very distinctly standing in my bedroom, I was 8 or 9, 10 years I old. I’m thinking, it’s not gonna change. It is just not going to change. But then I realized, cause I had older siblings who had left home. But one day it will, because I will leave home too and I cn change my life then. And that was, important for me. It was 1969, and I met this guy through my friend Terry. He had the kindest eyes, and he had a demeanor which a friend of mine in town here says he still has. He was very calm but he was just very caring and you felt like he was actually seeing you and hearing you. He originally had been from Long Island. His father had been in the schmatta trade, which means dressmaking trade if you don’t know the term, very New York term. And his Gary Drimmer. His parents had moved when he was eleven to Peru and he had gone to, finished up middle school gone to the equivalent of high school. In Spanish. By choice. Because he wanted to learn the foreign language. Well, we dated some, it wasn’t really serious but there was some connection and so when he left he said “I’ll write you,” and I thought right. At that point in my life I had learned that young men tend to lie a lot too. And they might mean to do things but they don’t always. So, we actually started writing and over the next three years we wrote letters, over a thousand of them. They were really the best way to get to know somebody. Because there was no interaction of you know sitting in the backseat of a car and what happens with that. So, it was more what was in your head. I mean he would talk about books he was reading. I would talk about issues I was having with my parents all the time which just was constant. I was really upset when he wrote me a letter that he was four years, four months younger and that he was Jewish. It was Jewish, didn’t bother me. The first boy I loved in fifth grade was Jewish. But you know it was like, “You were four months younger than me!” I felt like I was robbing the cradle. Which of course was hardly that. We continued to date each other during those 2 and a half of the three years until we decided okay, we got together he came back, up to the states and couple times and we got together then. Then we said, okay this is more serious than dating other people. Gary’s father writes, and there’s some, a lot of the letters are in there and asks, negotiates with Gary to come down to Peru to help him with the business he has, which is failing. Peru is a mess, it’s under a dictatorship and had been. And Gary negotiated, “Fine, but Candace has to come down with me and you can’t be saying anything about it.” Well, Gary’s parents were very very progressive, let me put it this way. They smoked pot with Gary in Peru, so that, I mean they’re dead no one can yell at them now. But I said “Oh my god! This is great!” So, we decided in late ‘71 I was gonna go down to Peru after I finished college in May at the University of Georgia. I got my first passport. I went to the library and got a bunch of books on Peru. Started reading about history. And I told my parents I was moving to Peru. Well, they couldn’t stop me I was 21, and turned 22 at the same, around the same time. So, in June of 1972, I left the United States with a passport in one hand and no idea what was gonna happen in the other. I mean, my father said, “You’re going to hell, and I won’t drive you to the airport”. My friends thought I was insane. “How do you know this guy?” “What do you know of this guy?” That kind of thing. But I felt I was doing the right thing. It was just like, the round peg into the round hole, I knew where I was, and this felt right. I got to Peru very early in the morning. After a long airline flight. Six months later we got married in a civil ceremony cause my parents refused to come to the religious one. And I was in the process of converting to Judaism with the only rabbi in the country. So, I learned, it was very lonely to be on your own, but I also learned that I am good at reaching out to people. And I learned to network with people. I would, if somebody invited me over for a cup of tea I might stay as long as they would let me stay in their house and pump their brain and try to get to know them. I really insinuated myself into people’s lives. I do remember things that I did, and it’s almost embarrassing but at the same time nobody ever said can’t you get out of my house, they understood, they all had been new at one point. So, I got to say I loved living abroad. It was the adventure that I had always wanted. I wanted adventure. I knew that. I also hated it at times. It was the biggest challenge. It grew me. It gave me the strength that I wasn’t raised with. It taught me I have more resources than I ever thought, and I loved ex-pats. Even the ones that I wouldn’t have spoken to for more than 5 minutes in the states. Because there was such a diversity of opinions, viewpoints, “lunch should be at 11:30, no 3 O’clock in the afternoon is early enough are you kidding?” I mean the world was just different. Previous Next

< Back Jacqueline's Story Jacqueline talks about the most important person in her life; her mom. She describes her perseverance, strength, and love for both her mother and her brother. 00:00 / 03:40 Can you tell me about the most important people in your life? Yeah, I would say definitely my mom, for obvious reasons. She's amazing. And she's definitely my biggest role model. My mom started, she went to college to be an accountant. And then she hated that, because she didn't like how accountants were very, to the point didn't have like much of a sense of humor. And she, she's such a big person. She's such a talker, so that was important to her. So then she went into health care, she went to nursing school. When I was about four, my parents got divorced me, my brother, and my mom went to go live with my uncle. And my aunt, my cousin in born, which is where we then bought our house. between in between when they got divorced, she was in the middle of nursing school, so I can't imagine how hard that was for her. So being with my living with my aunt uncle definitely made it easier for her. And we spent a lot of time with them one on one, then she started working down in P town, which is about maybe two hours from my house, maybe a little less. And she would go every day work double shifts, drive all the way home sleep and do it all over again. I don't know how she did it. And then she started teaching nursing assistants. And she loved it. She was working just as a teacher under the owner. And then the owner decided that she was going to sell the company. And my mom was devastated because she loved her job. So she ended up buying the school from her. She had the school for a while, probably like 10 years, it was definitely hard because the financial situation wasn't always constant. Because that's obviously what happens when you own your own business. And it will add everything fell on her if like one of her teachers couldn't go. So there were times where it was just her running the business. So she's definitely worked very hard. And then about three or four years ago, this nursing home agency reached out to her asking them asking her to teach all of their and all of their facilities. And she took it almost right away. She's still with the company. And that's the company that I've also worked through. I think as I'm aging, I'm becoming closer with my mom in a different way. Like we're becoming more like friends than mother and daughter even though she's always been like a friend to me and all my friends go to my mom for any problems, any advice, which I think is super important. Every year on my birthday since my birthday on Christmas Eve My mom always made sure no one could say the words Christmas Eve on my birthday. It was always Jacqueline's birthday. And she would always set up she'd had balloons and she loves cards. So she'd have like a million cards. And like just a whole setup and it was always so grand and special. And so that's every year. That's definitely something that I'm looking forward to. I would like to be as good of a mother as she has been to me. I think she's done. Such a good job raising my brother and I She's worked very hard. She hasn't had a lot of extra money or extra time or anything. So I think just making sure that when I'm older that I have the ability to take care of her like she took care of me Previous Next

< Back Savannah's Story Savannah speaks with Dennis about her experience living and working in Washington, DC the summer after her freshman year of college. Savannah discusses her determination to experience somewhere new, and how she was able to make it happen for herself. In her story, she touches on themes of loneliness, independence, family and friendship. Savannah reminds us that while independence is a virtue, we can all use some support to get where we're going. 00:00 / 03:57 So when I was looking at colleges, UMass was just sort of what made the most sense. But I also don't think it was expecting to have, I guess, the tough year that I did. I think UMass is a very big school. And it's an easy place to sort of get lost in. And I was really used to being at home in my hometown in my community that was so familiar. And I had a good group of friends and a good kind of support system. And I kind of went from that to go into this big place that was super vast, where no one's really keeping track of you or worrying about you. And I definitely felt lonely. So at the end of that year, I kind of knew that I had to do something different with my summer, I knew that I needed something that was a little bit more of a leap for me something that was challenging and new. And so I was like, okay, great, it's time to figure out how I'm going to spend the summer. So I ended up applying to an internship program in Washington, DC and spend two months of my summer living there is a really well set up program. And I think what draw me what drew me to it was it was pulling students from across the country around the world to which was really exciting to me. And I think the concept of the program gave me a little bit of the community that I knew I needed. And so once I kind of set my sights on that, at the end of my freshman year, that gave me a little bit of vigor, a little bit of excitement that I think I needed, then it was just time to kind of decide and figure out how I was going to make that happen for myself, I knew that this was going to be a good program, but I had to, like pay for the housing, I had to pay for some of the programming fee and things like that. My next kind of step was I have to find scholarships, I learned quickly that there's money floating around universities and floating around for a lot of the things that you want to do. People just tend to not know that those scholarships, those grants, those things are there. And so they don't look for them. So I made it my goal to find this funding to get me to DC. So that's what I did. I ended up applying to so many scholarships, writing so many essays, and all these different things. So I did get there, I always remember just like sitting on the plane and like taking a breath and being like, Wow, I can't believe I can, if I pull this together, it's amazing. And so from there it was, it was a really wonderful experience. I loved DC living there gave me kind of my first taste of like, what you would maybe call adult life. But I kind of got all I think the best parts of it. I think reflecting the important parts were the social parts and getting to be somewhere new and getting to kind of fulfill the plan that I had for myself, I think maybe twofold. I think I came back with some confidence. And I definitely learned that I had the ability to kind of dictate my environment and kind of get myself out of the funk that I was in, I think was really important. I can definitely see that I've grown in that way. I definitely hold on to that determination that I had and know that it's like still in me, how are you feeling about this next transition? And what do you see is coming next. So I've definitely been pretty stressed about my next transition. I think part of it is because this is something that I never would have, I think believed my freshman year but I have such a good and rich life here at UMass and in Amherst, that I think it feels intimidating to think about moving that somewhere new and even meeting new people. I think I am so kind of comfortable where I am. So I think making that transition is a little bit scary. But I also know that I have done it before when I went to DCA essentially picked myself up and moved to a new city for a couple months. And now it's just kind of doing the same thing, but for a little longer. And so I think I'm trying to harness that sort of can do attitude that I lose a little bit sometimes. And so I kind of try to take that from my summer, and I'm trying to kind of be hopeful and positive and excited. And I think that will serve me well. Previous Next

< Back Elise's Story Elise Boehm talks to Edie Kirk about her decision to study abroad in Cuba and what it was like once she got there. She shares stories about where she went and what she did but also how the people there made her feel more confident speaking Spanish. 00:00 / 03:24 My sophomore year at UMass Amherst I decided to go study abroad in Cuba and everything I would say went pretty well. You know one of the first things we did when everybody was there was we got to ride the ya know old-school classic Cuba cars. Which was I think one of the coolest things ya know we could have done. We took a ride around Havana just sightseeing ya know we got to take pictures with the car, in the car, outside of the car and it was a lot of fun. It was probably one of the best memories I have ya know when we were all like in the cars side by side, we were just like recording taking videos ya know I think the most important lesson that I learned is that even though I was scared of trying something new ya know I am glad that I did it and that I didn't let the fear of trying something new get in the way of me experiencing this great opportunity I think some of the best memories I have are when I push myself out of my comfort zone and just try something new ya know I am grateful that despite this being scary, being away in a completely different country and traveling alone I didn't let that fear get in my way I started to ya know feel more confident as time went on I mean I push myself to try some new things I was very grateful for that and I guess another thing that I was I guess happy with was that I got to get away from internet and what was happening back home because where we were at theres no internet so if we wanted to use the internet we would have to walk a few blocks to the nearest hotel and we would have to sit there and we would have to buy an internet card and put it in our phones and they we would have internet for how ever many minutes and so then thats how we communicate with the people back home and ya know go on social media and everything you would do on the internet and I think that ya know that being so far away and us not having like internet readily accessible was a great experience because its like we weren’t nt focused on like what was happening back home, what people were posting, what we were posting and so it was a way that we could fully embrace the experience and just be in the culture be in Cuba without adding these extra distractions ya know we really got to really experience it and i think that is one thing that I am proud of is that i dont think anyone on that trip really complained about the difficulties of getting internet because we were all having such a good time we were always busy or finding something to do whether it be going to classes, or going to the beach, going to the museum ya know we were constantly busy we had these field trips that we would go on so i think it was definitely a good experience overall. Previous Next

Amy shares about moving from NYC to Philadelphia as a young girl. During this time, she learned some of the hard lessons about hatred and what it means to stand out. She also learned that some of her closets friends are the ones who have the most differences between them. Amy's Story Amy shares about moving from NYC to Philadelphia as a young girl. During this time, she learned some of the hard lessons about hatred and what it means to stand out. She also learned that some of her closets friends are the ones who have the most differences between them. Scroll to listen Amy's Story 00:00 / 03:46

< Back Mary's Story Mary Young describes, in an interview with Hellen Muma, the cast-off treasures she discovered as a kid—and how those experiences turned her into a life-long collector. She shares a lesson learned from Louis Armstrong’s white handkerchief and remembers a great-aunt who influenced her with the gift of a corrugated gift box. 00:00 / 02:19 So, I know you have a lot of collections, and you keep creating new ones. What are some examples and what made you become a collector? I remember really clearly we lived in a sorta like actually my father taught in a boys boarding school so we lived in a dorm and you would take ethe trash all the way down to the basement to put it in these bins and I was old enough to take the trash down I guess for my mother So i as taking the trash down I went down to the trash room and I saw all this stuff and there was an older couple who worked was on the faculty and they were downsizing and they had piles of stuff and I was immediately really interested in it that was my earliest memory of finding extraordinary things in the trash and I’ve never stopped ever since When I was going through my paternal grandmothers stuff Among all the other stuff I found was a box of buttons I mean some of them were really old some go back to the 19th century and some buttons from when my grandmother during world war 2 was a part of the red cross ambulance driver corps ya know outside of Boston she didn't drive ambulances really but for some reason these women trained for that there were just and there were buttons they came from all different types of people now just women but mostly women the family and ya know from generations of all different people and I think I was already collecting antique buttons and I kind of dumped everything together and I would come up with some buttons from my mother and I’d put those in there and to me it's like this ocean of family history particularly for me of women history and it just is like it all flowed together into this soup and i just love that ya know I have made some things with the buttons like I've decorated some pillows with them I was thinking of framing some maybe I'll do it maybe I won't It's such an immediate connection to generations of women and its different as if I just got something from a tag sale cause this actually had to do something with people in my family who knows what but that's one example of potentially thousands I can tell. Previous Next

< Back Emily L's Story Emily discusses how her culture, once embarrassing to her, has helped her shape into the growing and caring person she is today. 00:00 / 02:35 Reflecting now, it's sad to say but I was definitely embarrassed at the time when I had to do all this or if my parents didn't understand or spoke to me in another language, like in public and I would have to translate it, I thought it was a little bit embarrassing– I don't know, I don't really want to talk, be different –I don't want to stand out in front of other people and so that was kind of like how I felt growing up. I did think resentment, I did a bit too just because I wish things were a little easier. I think that just because I had this role in my life it definitely made it a lot harder for me to be a kid and a student. I had to worry about making sure that my brother was taken care of as well in the school aspect of things, but now I'm just reflecting on it and I'm kind of grateful that they [my parents] didn't know how to speak English because now I know another language because of it and I don't mind helping them now. I'm so used to it that now I care for people a lot more deeply just because I've grown up to have to care for people, so I think its definitely made me grow as a person and mature in a way where it feels like, “oh this is not embarrassing or it wasn't embarrassing but more so I'm grateful” because I'm still connected to my roots and culture and I'm thankful that I know my language because when I go back to Malaysia I can connect with my family members there too so there's no disconnect really and even though I grew up here and they live across the world in a different society with different cultures, I still feel like I'm a part of the family too. Previous Next

Barbara shares her story of becoming the owner of a bookstore, specializing in antique books. She shares memories from these years including her knowledge of books. Barbara S's Story Barbara shares her story of becoming the owner of a bookstore, specializing in antique books. She shares memories from these years including her knowledge of books. Scroll to listen Barbara S's Story 00:00 / 04:14

< Back Owen's Story, 2024 00:00 / 04:48 How has life been different than what you'd imagine? Well, I guess starting back from when I graduated college, I thought when I was in college, I said, you know, I get married, have a job, have a bunch of kids, live in a house, you know, all that kind of stuff. And, you know, that eventually happened. But one thing that didn't happen that I really wanted to have happen was that I have three brothers, and I was hoping that, you know, we all live in the same area that, you know, maybe once a month, we get together for lunch, discuss how our parents are doing, you know, talk about the future, how you know, just sort of like a, you know, bunch of guys getting together and, you know, having a good time. And that never happened, for various reasons. And it was it was a big disappointment because, you know, these are, you know, three guys that I grew up with and spent a lot of time with and, you know, was looking forward to the future, them being part of the future. And, you know, as it turned out, they were not, a significant part of the future. I've had various relationships with different brothers at different times. But, short of going to funerals together, you know, there is very little of, spending time together on a regular basis. And, you know, there are lots of reasons for it. You know? Other brothers had children. You know, one moved away. You know, there are just all sorts of things that happened, but it just didn't work out. So, it was a it was a great disappointment for me. As for, you know, the other things, you know, I thought I'd get married and stay married forever because that's, you know, how I experienced life when I was growing up. You know, my parents got married and they stayed married until they died. And, you know, so I expected that. And it turned out I ended up getting divorced. And, you know, that was sort of a surprise for me, but there was really no choice. I've made something for me to continue having a decent life. That had to happen. What else? You know, I wanted to have a bunch of kids, but I ended up only having one. And, you know, that was a disappointment for me. And, basically, my relationship with my wife did not permit us to have more than one child. So, you know, that didn't work out. So, there's a bunch of things that that I had imagined would be a certain way in my life and then and weren't that way. You know, I would spend my life in one place and, you know, retire and, you know, do whatever old people do when they retire, which I haven't figured out yet, but I'm still trying to work that one out. So, you know, that was not, as I had expected my life to be. You know, that that that's part of it. It doesn't mean that that since that didn't work out as I expected, it doesn't mean that what I ended up with was bad. It's just not what I had expected to be. I guess looking back at it now, now that you're older, now that these things has happened in your life, I guess, like, do you accept it now? Like, are you more okay with it now than before? Well, there there's some things I am and some things I'm not. You know, I got married a second time. I got another kid. So, I have two kids now. So, you know, that's helped. With my brothers, you know, I have one brother I talk to. I have one brother we have I have no communication with, and I have another brother who we have a very tentative email relationship with. So, you know, I'm not happy about that, but it's it is what it is. And, you know, one of the things I didn't mention was I always wanted to have grandchildren. Right? I now have three grandchildren. It's great. I love it. I spend as much time as I can with them, and it's as much fun or more fun than I thought it was gonna be. And I really, really enjoy, even more than I thought I would. And I think in part two I always enjoyed being with my grandparents, and it was just it was a a special thing. And, I'm hoping that my grandkids have that same experience and take it with them through. Previous Next

Marci's Story Scroll to listen Marci's Story 00:00 / 03:26

< Back Abby's Story Abby talks about her adventures while traveling. She talks about her experience studying abroad and traveling as a young kid and how that shaped her into the person she is. Scroll to listen 00:00 / 04:02 Basically, growing up, traveling was a really big part of my life, one special one that I remember was when I was going into my junior year in high school, they took us to Peru for 3 weeks. For 2 of the weeks we were living on a boat on the Amazon River which was really really cool. We were kind of like helping college students who were doing their thesis or dissertations. We were basically going in and out of the Amazon Rainforest and helping them collect data. It was an awesome experience. It made me look at my life differently, it was my first time traveling without my family. But also while we were there we were able to go to a little village for the day and the villagers just showed us around their homes but we were hanging out with all the little kids and we brought them school supplies and gifts but it was just awesome to see, it was like Christmas day for them when we came they were so excited and that really put a lot of things into perspective because coming from America we just have a lot more things than other countries do, so it was just a really awesome experience and it really shows me a lot about life and how materialistic things like that doesn’t really matter. From that traveling really became my passion, I knew I loved going to new places and experiencing new cultures and seeing different cultures. So, I knew when I came to college, I was going to study abroad no matter what. I went abroad in Fall 2021, and I went to Verona, Italy. It was one of the best experiences of my life. It was my favorite semester in college so far. I was able to travel a ton, I met a lot of new people, I learned so much about myself, I grew as a person. You kind of learn to be comfortable with being uncomfortable if that makes sense, you just are kind of thrown into situations that you usually wouldn’t be in and you kind of just got to figure it out. Like it's been an experience that pushed me so far out of my comfort zone, but it was amazing and so worth it. You just kind of got to learn to just go with the flow and stuff won’t always go the way you planned and that’s okay. My first trip was to Lake Como in Italy. It was one of my favorite trips on that I went on there, it was beautiful and so fun but I think what made it one of my favorite trips was the people I was with and we were just hanging out and having fun and getting to know each other because we were only 3 weeks in so it wasn’t like we knew each other super well. My last trip was to London, basically to London we were just being the biggest tourists you could be. We were doing all the touristy things, we went and saw the London Eye, we saw Great Ben, we saw the Parliament, we saw Buckingham Palace, everything that was stereotypical and touristy about London, we did it. My current job right now which I love is at our study abroad office at UMass. I basically just encourage kids to go abroad and tell them that they can do it, I know it's scary, but you got it. I am working for Teach for America when I graduate, before this year I've always known about it but never thought I'd be able to get in. Previous Next