Bio, 2014: Bob Walton
“Tired of lying in the sunshine staying home to watch the rain.
You are young and life is long and there is time to kill today.
And then one day you find ten years have got behind you.
No one told you when to run, you missed the starting gun.”
–“Time,” Pink Floyd, Dark Side of the Moon
Fifty years since high school! It finds me working harder than I ever have, running a small factory behind my house that changes U.S. currency into dog shit. How did this happen, and why am I so happy about it?
Like some of you, I’m sure, I spent most of the last 50 years searching for what’s important in life. In my case, I got an engineering degree at OSU, wasted a couple years in Fort Worth in the army, and followed that with a few uneventful years as an engineer in Dallas (although I got to spend some time in Singapore, which was great). In the mid 1970s, I found myself newly single (some of you may remember that Connie Babb and I were married as mere children just out of high school). I got an MBA and went to work in financial planning for a Dallas chain of department stores. That was about as exciting as it sounds. Life passes quickly, and I was already feeling that I might have missed the starting gun. I began thinking about becoming my own boss.
I quit my day job and went into the newspaper business, buying and managing and selling weekly newspapers, all in Texas except for an ill-fated venture in Australia. It was, finally, something I loved to do. Couldn’t wait to get up in the morning and all that. I also got married to my wife, Christine, in 1984 at St. John’s Chapel in northern England, where my ancestors worshipped in the 1600s. (Many thanks to my mother for her genealogy hobby.) So, 2014 is not only my 50th high school reunion, it’s also my 30th wedding anniversary. After almost 20 years in newspapers, I sold the business and retired in the late ‘90s. I had been very lucky to do something fun for a long time, but was it important? I don’t know. We took a few scuba diving trips to Australia and Belize and spent a week in South Africa. I got some sponsors together and brought a women’s pro circuit tennis tournament to Dallas (cue the red ink!). Six months later, I was bored.
Then in 1999 my “real” life started. With time on my hands for the first time in 40 years, I went to work at an animal shelter and learned to rehabilitate and re-home problem dogs. Bingo. I’m still at it 15 years later with a small sanctuary behind my house, home to a rotating pack of 20-30 dogs in various stages of rehab or who have signed on to stay. It’s as close to what’s important in life as I think I’m going to get, and nobody my age should be so happy. Now, I just need another 50 years. This time I’d spend them all with dogs.
–Bob Walton
©2009 Stillwater High School Class of 1964