James Eichenlaub

Posted on: Aug 06, 2022 at 7:36 AM

(Eccl. 9:11) "I saw something else under the sun: The race is not to the swift, nor the battle to the strong; neither is the bread to the wise, the wealth to the intelligent, nor the favor to the skillful. For time and chance happen to all."

As with many others in these increasingly chaotic times, I am returning to the workforce. Having accepted a position at the Daytona Beach Advent Hospital, I am happy to say that I will support the nursing staff and patients as a Unit Liaison in the Patient Surgical Care Unit. I had always desired to work in the medical field, and this is likely as close as I will ever come to it. I will be Basic Life Support certified and a CNA (Certified Nursing Assistant).

Many wanted to get together at the reunion, but to be perfectly honest, I doubt that I would remember anyone. Those few guys that I barely came to know back then are gone except one, and I doubt that he and I would cross paths,

Many things changed for me since retiring. I find that all the things I "thought" were of interest...those many things I "never had time for" during the working years...are not as interesting as I assumed they would be.

Music, for instance. I purchased a very expensive "Super 20 'b' flat trumpet" that I ended up giving to my grandson for use in the high school stage band. He graduated and it now sits in my study on the stand, tarnished and alone beneath the guitars that hang on the wall and adjacent to the clarinet on which I can play only one song, "Stranger on the Shore."

Besides those odd things, my faith in God has grown along with my knowledge of the realities and fallacies of religion. I find that I write a lot, and I think/meditate even more. That same eternal, internal battle we learned of from the Bible, the one that goes on inside each of us, rages on but is not as bad as it did before. (Romans 7:14-16)

Anyway, I hope each of you is fairing well these days, or as good as can be expected. From my perspective, things will worsen before they improve until that time that the one infallible leader whose laws and direction are acceptable to all, the one that will finally bring humanity to a united whole under God's Kingdom; until that time, I wish you well and pray for all.

Posted on: Aug 06, 2022 at 6:36 AM

Posted on: Jun 03, 2021 at 11:23 AM

https://www.oakleaves.me/post/remembering-mr-pittman-altoona-pd-c1965

Posted on: Jun 03, 2021 at 11:22 AM

Posted on: Jan 23, 2020 at 10:10 AM

Posted on: Jul 08, 2019 at 10:50 AM

Having lived through Don McLean's, American Pie, we are a generation the likes of which will never be seen again, as they say. Our school years were, without doubt, our 'formative' years, and for myself...as one who does NOT recall those year with fondness, I say to all those who belittled, punched, slapped, ignored, laughed at, and ridiculed me: I thank you!

To those few whom I do fondly remember (Randy, Ralph, and Will) I say thank you as well, you made those last few year tolerable enough, and there were so many others I knew only in passing; those to whom I was just another kid in school and who generally ignored me; I thank you for not being unkind.

A special thanks to Ted P., who tried to bring me up in stature and style but was unable to rescue me from my darkness. To Fred C., who was a giant among students and who often kept the bullies off of me, and to Amy D. (with whom I had a torrid love affair, but she never knew about it because we never spoke to one another), and to whom I looked forward to passing in the hall and would walk as near to her as I possibly could, and scurried away when she looked in my direction.

We can attribute our successes and failures, to some degree, on those years we spent together. To some, the happiest years of their lives, to others, just a passing mirage of friendships where hearts and minds connected with one another to form this succession of timeless acquaintances. To some few of us, however; it was a time when we were convinced that we lived outside the norm and standard; the small, the inept, the presumed indolent whose lives sprung from poverty and lacked erudition.

Finally, to Mr. Butler who, during orientation, convinced me that high school was not for me when he said, “Eichenlaub…another dropout like the rest of your lazy family,” setting the tone with which I would attend to the next few years of my ‘learning’. But, as it turns out, those words echoed in my mind through all these years and actually became a proponent of my success. Thank you Mr. Butler.