I was born in Berkeley California, the oldest of four siblings. When I was young, I loved to dabble in art, but once I graduated from High School I married a man in the military and I had five children. Needless to say, art was not high on my priority list. While living in Fort Ord I decided to sell Tupperware and found I was pretty good in sales. We later moved to Maryland, then to the Island of Crete for 5 years and then Turkey for 4 years.

While in Crete, I needed a job but did not want to work in the Base Exchange for $2 an hour. So, I wrote to Tupperware in Florida and asked if they might be willing to send Tupperware to Crete. Six or seven months later I received a telegram and a visit from the Tupperware Director in Greece as well as the overall Tupperware “honcho” for all of Europe. Who knew Tupperware was sold in Europe? I sure didn’t.

I made many sales selling to the Americans living in Crete. It was a challenge as my local manager was Greek and the catalogues were in Greek. That is when I started learning Greek. I also had to convert dollars to Drachmas (no euros at that time) and learn how to do my banking in Greek Banks. All deliveries were made on three, and sometimes four, motorcycles with boxes piled high on the back of their motorcycles.

When we were in Ankara, Turkey, I had black hair at the time and looked Turkish. I picked up the Turkish language and travelled everywhere on the local buses and “dolmush” (taxi). I had a baby in a military hospital in Germany and later another baby in a Greek hospital in Iraklion where I lived.