After I graduated from St. Thomas Aquinas in June of 1965, I moved with my parents to Port Jefferson Station on Long Island. I had been accepted and enrolled in St. Joseph’s Commercial High School in Brooklyn, but all that had to change due to our move to Long Island. So in September 1965 I started at Mercy High School in Riverhead. It was quite a culture shock for me. Here I was the little girl from Brooklyn now finding herself in Riverhead at a school among the potato fields. The one thing that my teachers, The Sisters of Mercy, told my parents that immediately made me stand out was how quickly I walked through the school halls compared to the local students. I graduated from Mercy H.S. in June of 1969. I then attended Suffolk County Community College for 2 years and graduated from the Certified Dental Assistant Program and started my first real job.

I met my future husband in the summer of 1971. We were married in October of 1972 and resided in The Village of Lynbrook. How interesting that Lynbrook is a play on words for Brooklyn. We were very fortunate to be able to adopt a little boy from Bogotá, Colombia in December of 1979 at the age of two months. Our son Joey today is 24 and serving in the United States Army in Iraq. He arrived there in October of 2003 and as I write this will be there for several more months. My husband Joe died suddenly in 1995 when Joey was 15. How proud he would be of our son if he were here today. I have enough pride for both of us.

I now live and work in Port Jefferson, New York. My life has brought me back to the area I lived in during high school days. Life can bring us full circle. At least it did in my opinion. Finding the St. Thomas Aquinas website and anticipating a wonderful reunion with all of you is a prayer answered. It will bring me back to my roots.

My parents and many of their friends also attended St. Thomas Aquinas School, graduating in the late 1930’s and early 1940’s.

Looking forward to the future I will close and wish you all peace.