Janet (Coles)

Since leaving school I have travelled a road encountering many crossroads that, on reflection, have provided me with an amazing life. I married Winston shortly after leaving school and we had two children, Jason and Rachel. Due to Winston’s employer IBM, which we jokingly referred to stood for I’ve Been Moved – we lived in Toronto, Canada; Canberra; Darwin; Brisbane with our final move being to Sydney. After 20 years of marriage Winston and I went our separate ways. I moved to the Inner West of Sydney with just over a ½ hour walk to get into the city.

My career path has been varied with positions such as Office Manager, Senior Customer Service Manager to where I am working now. The company is a Management Consultancy and I am the Practice Manager and also do some Management Consulting. I am also very fortunate in that my boss, his wife and boys have become my close friends. I have just clocked up 10 years and for the first time in my life have long service leave.

Travel has been a part of my life having been to Canada, USA, Thailand, England, Scotland, Czech Republic, Italy, Greece, India, Ireland, Turkey, Hungary, Germany, France, Austria,… and am off on a 4 month trip to Africa in November this year.

For those of you who aren’t aware my sister in law is Pat (Kirkham) and my brother in law is Will or Bill (Walker) so the ties to Watson High are ever present in my life. I had the pleasure of having Beth (Munroe) and her hubby visit me recently; see Lesley (Stenhouse) occasionally and still consider Anne (Bennie) and her hubby Ron as some of my best friends.

The trip that I am going on in Africa (thanks to long service leave) will be with my brother David and sister in law Pat (Kirkham). Let’s hope that the air currents are good the day we are meant to be taking our balloon ride over the Serengeti!

I am the very proud grandmother of 7 grandchildren that my son Jason and his wife Amber have produced, with the eldest being 13 and the youngest 2. My daughter Rachel and her partner Martin live near me in Sydney and they are expecting their first child in April 2010. That Grandparent feeling is just amazing!

Well done to the organising committee, I am sure it will be a great success and in some instance like time has not passed, just the vessels that carry the memories have aged.

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