CURRENT MISSION

Learn more, listen more, and travel as much as possible. Remember the words on 1 of my shirts: "Books. Cats. Life is Good."

ABOUT US

Jerry and I come from very different backgrounds, have different levels of education, and I am more "techy" than Jerry is. We love each other very much. We have even more in common. We laugh at the same things, enjoy playing with words, both like to talk, both like to listen, cook, hike, are former Nordic skiers, enjoy bicycling, travel, photography, gardening, geo-caching, and now origami. We have a Miata called "Bookish" because we both like to read. We owned sailboat years ago and are still interested in sailing. We both like to meet new people. Jerry and I met when he was assisting an elderly neighbor to interview prospective tenants for a rental house located behind his house. Thanks to Jerry, I became a grandma the easy way, and now a great-grandma.

Susan: I am the middle of 3 sisters in terms of time and love. I have known my younger sister, also known as stepsister, since she was 11 and I was 14. I grew up in Tacoma, Washington until I was 2 days shy of being 16, and then my family moved to Forest Grove, Oregon.(Near Portland) Originally I set out to study to be a teacher, and then in a round about route became a professional librarian. My first job out of library school was in Queens. (I worked at several branches, including Corona, Jackson Heights, and Forest Hills.) We referred to Manhattan as the City. I lived in Oregon briefly for a time, and then moved in 1976 to Whidbey Island, about 90 minutes north of Seattle, and that is where I have lived ever since. I was a librarian over 20 years at a naval air station, then a school library assistant, and special education assistant. I have now retired from work for the school district.

Jerry has one older sister. He has lived much of his life in Oak Harbor. Exceptions: he lived and worked in Alaska as a commercial fisherman, and as a logger. He was in the US Air Force for 4 years, and was stationed in Klamath Falls, Oregon. He also worked at the Boeing Aircraft Factory. For the past 37 years he has had his own business repairing furnaces, air conditioners, heat pumps and commercial equipment. Jerry has a high school education. He reads a great deal.

We both believe in lifelong learning.

PHILOSOPHY

Respect others and their viewpoints. Listen. Always keep a sense of humor. Increase understanding of ourselves and others. Keep learning throughout life. Be a traveler, not just a tourist.

Why I’m on Couchsurfing

HOW I PARTICIPATE IN COUCHSURFING

We enjoy both couch-surfing and hosting.

COUCHSURFING EXPERIENCE

We have hosted several times and looking forward to more.

We have now had 6 very positive surfing experiences, one in Passy (Rhone-Alpes) and one in Nancy, France, one in Washington, D. C., and two different hosts in Fort Lauderdale, one in Hillsboro, Oregon, and one near Nagano, Japan. . We have enjoyed very much talking very much with our hosts about things like culture, music, education, language, and of course traveling. We have learned from each other. We have cooked for each other.

We have stayed with a British couple we met while river rafting in Utah. We have also stayed with my British friend. She and I have written to each other for 55 years.

Related participation: the past several years we have host family for academic year exchange students from Belgium, Japan, China, Thailand, Taiwan, Mongolia, Slovakia and Italy. We have also hosted short term exchange students from China and Japan, as well as an adult Chinese who was chaperone to students.

One summer we stayed with 2 of our former "kids" and their families.

This year we got to spend one day with the families of 2 of our Japanese 'kids." We also got to spend 2 days with one our our former academic year students, and her mother in Thailand.

Once, many years ago when I had been to Palm Springs, California for a job interview, I chatted with a family, who invited me to spend the night at their home near Los Angeles, and then took me to the airport to catch my flight back home.

In Australia, I stayed with friends of friends in Queensland, and with people I met in church in Melbourne.

Interests

Photography, natural world and hiking, geology, cooking, gardening , cruising, origami, knitting, crocheting, talking to a variety of people, geocaching, old trains, boating, old cars, meeting other people, languages (Susan), hosting exchange students and /or CSers, traveling, fishing, cats, and reading. We also enjoy bicycling.

• animals
• cats
• birds
• culture
• books
• photography
• education
• cooking
• walking
• boating
• reading
• traveling
• cars
• socializing
• knitting
• origami
• music
• fishing
• hiking
• teaching
• geography
• geology
• languages
• mountains
• bicycling
• tai chi
• geo-caching

Music, Movies, and Books

Books: almost any non-fiction. "The Last Lecture" by Randy Pausch is one of my favorite books. I also enjoy reading science fiction and mystery stories.

Music: We like most forms of music. We enjoy classical music, *some* rock and roll, and "oldie but goodies" from the 1950s and 1960s.

Movies: There are some movies we cordially invite each other to go see alone, LOL. Among our favorite movies: "I Know Where I'm Going!", "Catch Me If You Can", "Hidden Figures""Sixth Sense", "Saving Mr. Banks,"and "Avatar."

One Amazing Thing I’ve Done

There is more than one amazing thing we have seen, so I will mention some among many:

Swimming with sea lions in the Galapagos Islands.

Walking on the Great Wall of China.

Being passenger on a trishaw in the busy streets of Saigon. (Ho Chi Minh City.}

Walking among the frigate birds and other animals in the Galapagos.

Seeing the planet Venus, and other stars and planets in a sky with zero light pollution during one night at a hut in Eastern Washington State after a day of Nordic skiing to get there.

Swimming with stingrays in the Bora Bora lagoon.

Kayaking in New Zealand's Bay of Plenty.

Seeing Antarctica from the deck of a cruise ship.

Exploring both sides of Niagara Falls.

Teach, Learn, Share

We like to cook, and learn more about cooking. We love to hear others talk about their lives.

Both of us really enjoy geo-caching. This is a way to learn more, explore the world around us whether it is in our own neighborhood, or on the other side of the world. Geocaching is a way to rejoice in human creativity, notice more, and meet people from all over.

What I Can Share with Hosts

Cooking, hiking, stories about traveling, laughter, love of reading, geocaching, origami, and of course love of life.

Countries I’ve Visited

Antarctica, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Aruba, Australia, Bahamas, Belgium, Canada, Cayman Islands, Chile, China, Costa Rica, Denmark, Dominican Republic, Ecuador, Estonia, France, French Polynesia, Germany, Greece, Greenland, Guatemala, Iceland, Italy, Japan, Mexico, Netherlands, Netherlands Antilles, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Norway, Panama, Philippines, Russian Federation, Singapore, South Korea, Sweden, Thailand, Turks and Caicos Islands, United Kingdom, Uruguay, Venezuela, Viet Nam

Countries I’ve Lived In

United States

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