Russell Waterman
Bonjour à tous mes amis,
I was pleasantly surprised to get a phone call from the Dean of class reunions, John Hoffman, by way of his secret service agent, Heather Young Chambers, who uncovered my whereabouts. My picture was missing from the Torch Grad class photos, but as most of you went through high school in four years, I elected to take the six year program.
From high school, I went into the primary textile trade which offered, at that time, a bastion of opportunity to people who didn’t have a university degree but could think and act with what their street smarts told them. I stayed in textiles working in sales and marketing until my retirement in 2004.
Until 1998, I basically lived all of my life in good old TMR. After that I moved to our country home in Val-David, Quebec.
When I was 27, je me suis marié avec ma belle femme, Marie-Andree Claude. Nous avons trois enfants:
—Eric, 32, who has his CA and MBA, and works in marketing,
—Anik, 30, who is a Level 4 ski instructor, teaches skiing in winter, and mows golf courses in the summer, and
—Nadia, 27, a medical doctor who studies, works and travels the world.
I don’t travel. I go as far south as St-Jerome pour magasiner avec ma jolie femme chez Costco. And as far north as Mont-Tremblant to ski. The best way to describe myself and what I do with some of my retirement time is I am like a kid who plays in a sand box, only I play with bigger toys. When I first retired, I thought I’d like to get into golf. So I built myself a one-hole golf course. 80 yards from the back tees to the green. I would play three balls at a time, so it took me 1/2 hour to play 18 holes. Then I heard about blue algae, and how it was killing a lot of lakes in the Laurentians. As my golf course bordered a small pond and a stream, I became an environmentalist, and closed the golf course.
In the picture above, you’ll see me standing beside a small French Canadian cabin that I built. For the first floor, all the logs were cut and shaped using my chain saw. Then I got smart and bought myself a portable sawmill which now allowed me to cut more wood and move on to other projects around the property.
If any of you are planning retirement, my best advice is to make sure that you have lots of hobbies, and not be afraid to try anything that you think you might like. I enjoy oil painting, playing guitar, mountain biking, cross-country skiing and kayaking. Je joue au hockey deux fois par semaine, du mois d’aout jusqu’en avril. Notre ligue est excellente, la moyenne d’age est de 62. We play slower than slow motion. I am an ardent alpine skier, and still race at Quebec Masters GS races. The parabolic ski has done wonders for us to keep skiing. Just as the technology of the internet has allowed us to come together at this moment in time and say hello to each other.
To John Hoffman—vas-y à’planche—(go for it)
Merci
Russell
PS: My apologies to Judy Dixon. She did tell me in March 89 that the class of ’64 was working on a reunion. Would I be interested? And I said no. And it may still be no. But to say hello to everyone out there and read all about them on the internet, that is a whole other story.
I encourage everyone to send in something even if it is only a picture. As Don (Yukon) White did. He’s got a glass of wine in his hand, he dresses in a nice dark suit, he’s leaning back but able to keep his balance, and he looks fine.
Merci
Russell Waterman