I graduated with a degree in special education in 1981. I wanted to find a job in a small town far enough from San Antonio to give me independence, but not so far that I couldn't go home on a whim. When I started looking at postings, Waelder ISD came up. I was instantly interested because about two years before, I had gone to Waelder to help my roomate and best friend, Jim Gips, move furniture left to him by an aunt who had recently passed. His dad met us there in a Uhaul, and we spent a couple of hours loading up dressers, a china cabinet, a dining table, and about twelve chairs. The furniture was old heavy real wood stuff. It weighed a ton. It was not a fun job. But, Waelder charmed me from the get-go.

I drove to Waelder for an interview. They wanted to hire one special education teacher to service the whole district. I really wanted the job. I felt that the interview wet really well, but when my car wouldn't start, and I had to ask the highschool principal to help me start it, my hopes of getting the job were dashed. I was actually surprised when I got the call a few days later telling me the job was mine.

I drove back to Waelder to fill out all the paperwork. While I was there, they referred me to a Mrs. Wolf, who had an apartment for rent close to the school. I drove over to her house and drank iced tea at her kitchen table while she told me all about the apartment and asked me all about me. Since there weren't any other spaces for rent due to the oil boom in the area, I went ahead and took it sight unseen. The rent was $120 a month, which sounded pretty good to me, since my pay was only going to be a lot less than I had imagined while going to college.

I drove over to the apartment with a key in my pocket. It was closer to the school than I expected. In fact it was three houses down the street from the school. It was in the first floor of a two story garage building. The top floor was probably built as servants quarters. My apartment was a cheaply constucted efficiency apartment with concrete walls and really low ceilings.They had literally built walls to divide a two-car garage into three rooms. A kitchen and bathroom were on the right half. The left half was a combination bedroom and living room. The whole place was dark and smelled moldy. There was a bout an inch of space between the front door and the floor, which allowed a constant stream of insects to come in. But it was MINE!

I threw all the stuff I had in San Marcos and my dog Trooper in my little Honda Civic and moved into my new bachelor pad. Even though I quickly adjusted to living there, I never felt really comfortable. No matter how much I tried to clean it up, it still felt like a dump. On top of that, it was unairconditioned. The hot and humid Texas nights were almost unbearable. There was a window in the kitchen. That was it. I would leave the door open, but there was almost no air flow at all. I had a big box fan that I pointed right on me, but it didn't do much. I remember how I finally fell asleep after tossing and turning in sweat soaked sheets the first night, only to be awakened by the roar of a train going through town on tracks about 50 yards from my place. It was going to be a long summer.

About midway through the summer, I was awakened during the night by Trooper whining and a new sound that I couldn't quite figure out. I kept a flashlight by my bed because I didn't have a lamp, yet. There was a bare bulb in the middle of the ceiling, but the switch was by the front door. I would turn the light off, walk to bed with the flashlight on, get in bed, and set the flashlight on an old ratty dinette chair that I pulled from the kitchen. I turned on the flashlight and saw what was going on. Trooper was splashing around in about three inches of water! I had evidently slept through a torrential downpour that was flooding the street. Water was flowing down the sidewalk into my front door. I pulled the plug on the fan before thinking it through and got Trooper up on the bed with me.

It soon became obvious that the water was rising. My plan of riding it out on the bed, was not going to work. Instead, I put Trooper's leash on him, and walked to Mrs. Wolf's house. It started to pour again about halfway there. By the time I got to the house, Trooper and I were totally soaked. I banged on the door until Mrs. Wolf finally opened up. I could tell she was annoyed at being bothered during the night, but when I explained the situation, she went and got a key to the upstairs apartment and said we could spend the night there. I was a little worried about that, but she assured me that the flood in my apartment was not the result of any river or creek flooding. I don't know how she knew for sure that it wouldn't get any worse, but at least I would be on the second floor, if it did.

Trooper and I went back and waded through about a foot of water to get to the outside stairs that led up to the apartment. I unlocked the door and turned on the light. I was both amazed and angered by what I saw. The upstairs was very nice. The floor plan was the same as downstairs, but that was where the similarities ended. There were three windows with beautiful window sills in the living room area. The baseboards and trim around the doors were nicely crafted and painted. The bathroom had a pedastal sink, an old fashioned "water closet" toilet, and a clawfoot tub with a shower that came up from the spiggot. The kitchen had real nicely crafted wooden cabinets and two more windows! The gas stove was a beautiful old fashioned thing with a lid that covered the burners when not in use. There was a built in ironing board behind a door in the kitchen wall. There were beautiful old antique light fixtures hanging from high ceilings in all three rooms.

I was angry because I had been told that there was only one apartment available for rent. I quickly figured out that the downstairs apartment, being such a dump, was harder to rent. When I asked the next morning why Mrs. Wolf hadn't offered the upstairs one to me, she said she thought I would rather not have to climb the stairs. I told her that was not a problem for me, and asked her, if under the circumstances, she would mind if I moved in up there. I could tell she was not really happy about it, but she agreed, so Trooper and I moved in that day, and stayed there for two years, until I moved out to the farmhouse in Mt. Eden. But that's another story.