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Susan Mellor | Shanna Angle | Connie Meeks

January 2006

Susan Mellor:
Hello everyone!

Sorry I couldn’t make it to the reunion. I really wanted to come. I was having car trouble and pregnancy trouble at the same time. I didn’t want to get stranded somewhere.

Most of you really didn’t know me that well in high school. I was (and still am) very shy. That made it very hard for me to start a new school in 11th grade. When I left PC and moved to the St. Louis area after 10th grade, I thought my life was finally going to be better. But moving to a school with a graduating class of over 300 was very hard. I had lived in PC for 5 years prior to that and Monett for 1 year before that. I didn’t know what it was like going to school with that many people. There was no way I was going to get to know that many people. And I didn’t. I had very few friends. Most of those I had been friends with from spending summers with my grandma all my life. I love living in St. Louis. I don’t live in the city. I live in St. Louis County. Most people think of St. Louis as being this big city with crime. Only parts of the city are like that. The County though is completely different. In fact the city I live in, Lemay, is a lot like Pierce City. I do miss PC now though. Now that I’m older with children, I can appreciate what it was like living in a small town where everybody knows you. Although I don’t think I could go back to living in a small town. I like having a movie theater, grocery store, bank, gas station, and countless restaurants within just a few miles.

Since graduating high school, I attended 2 years of college to get an Associates degree in Accounting. I decided in my last class that being an accountant is not what I wanted to do. I wanted to be a travel agent so I could travel or help other people plan their travel. I got an Associates degree in Travel & Tourism. In 1992 I got a job with Maritz Travel Company. Maritz sold their travel division to Carlson Wagonlit Travel in 2004. I have been with the company ever since. Boy was I wrong about what it would be like to be a travel agent. I work in corporate travel which means I book people who are traveling on business. Nothing glamorous. Also I don’t get to travel very much. We don’t get hardly any discounts. I can’t afford to travel. Now with 2 kids I don’t seem to have the time or energy either.

I have been married for 11 years. My husband, Charles (Chuck), is a public safety officer at Maryville University. He has not found his career yet. He was a nurse assistant when I met him. Since then he has worked as a security officer at many different places, a firefighter, and a paramedic.

I have 2 beautiful children. Alyssa is 8 years old and in 2nd grade. She is very smart. I’m so proud of her. She loves school. She is very good at writing. She wants to be a marine biologist when she grows up. She loves watching cooking shows. I keep telling her she should think about culinary arts but she will not change her mind. She can’t be a marine biologist living in St. Louis which means she will have to leave her mommy some day. I know she will probably change her mind many times. She sings in the children’s choir at church. She is a very big help to me around the house and with the baby. Alexander was born Oct. 15th, 2005. He is a very good baby. When he was 3 weeks old he had to have surgery for pyloricstenosis. This is a condition where the pyloric muscle in the stomach is too tight and will not allow food to pass from the stomach to the intestines. They had to cut the muscle so it would relax. He recovered just fine from the surgery. He has started to smile now and does so every time he hears his mommy’s voice!! Alyssa loves him so much.

I have pretty much done everything I have wanted to do in life (except fly an airplane). I have several really good friends that I love spending time with when I can. I would love to keep in touch with more of my old class mates from Pierce City though. My mom lives in Springfield now and I come to see her about once a year. More if I can. I would love to visit with my old friends when I’m in town. Email me if you would like to keep in touch. My email is susan.mellor@gmail.com. I hope to hear from a few people. Talk to you soon!!!

TOP July 2005
Shanna Angle

Dear Class of 1985,

Wow, 20 years out and I am still as lost as I was when I walked out those gym doors for the last time. I have tried several times to find my nitch, the place where I belong, the career I was meant to do for the rest of my life; but I haven't found it yet. In 1994 I went to Crowder and received my certification in water/wastewater, went to work for the City of Bentonville in 1996 as a wastewater operator. I was there for four years before I walked away from it after my sister had a terrible car accident on her way to my sons birthday party. In 2000 we moved to Pampa, TX where I went to work for OMI--wastewater again. After a year there my son moved to Monett to live with his dad and I stayed in Texas for another year and a half. I moved back to Butterfield after a breakdown. Robert came to live with me in the summer of 2004 and has been with me every since. I now work in my father’s chicken house and am learning the ways of the farm so as to run it when he is no longer able. I will be starting as a Special Education Aide for the Southwest Washburn School District this year.

I have a son (Robert Adam Leach) who will be 14 at the end of August. He is the love of my life and the reason I get out of bed everyday. Make no mistake he is no angel but he is mine. He will be starting the 8th grade at Cassville this year. I have never married. Mom is semi-retired; she no longer teaches high school however, she is teaching biology at Crowder. She and my dad travels some and are in good health. Beth has two boys 17 and 14 she is married and living in Orting, WA. She is going back to college for her teaching certificate and her husband is a US Air Marshall.

Sorry I was not able to attend and a special apology to those on the planning committee for letting you all down. I do not go out in public unless absolutely necessary and I have tried very hard to avoid running into people who "knew me when..." I hope this night finds all of you well and happy, after all you are among friends. Lift your voices up and let the laughter ring out as you share your memories.

Warm thoughts and wishes to you all,
Shanna Angle

TOP July 2005
Connie Meeks:

Hello Classmates of 1985:

20 years and I'm still here! Gosh, where to start....Soon after graduation I married my high school sweetheart from Monett, James Meeks, and moved to Monett. We've been married 19 years now and I really wouldn't know what to do without him. Someone once asked him how we keep it together and he told them it was because we've been through so much together that all the things he and his wife were fighting about were really just little things and if most married couples would stop looking at those little things as mountains and consider them just irritations, they'd probably be happier too.

In December of 1988 we had a beautiful daughter, Lita Kaylie Meeks. Kaylie turned 16 last year and is now cruising Monett and Pierce City. She is a junior this year at Monett and has been a starting varsity volleyball player for the past 2 years. She has also made the Springfield club ball team that is a Junior Olympic program for the past 4 years. This past year she was chosen to play on an elite team out of St. Louis region and ranked 17th in the region. She loves volleyball and plans to teach after college.

In April of 1990 we had a handsome son, James Von Meeks II. On June 15th, I put him to bed just like any other night and the next morning he had died in his sleep of what they call SIDS - Sudden Infant Death Syndrome. He had been to the doctor for his 6 week check up only a week before and all was good. He was only 7 1/2 weeks old. We miss him every day still, but have chosen to use this to help others that lose children or grandchildren get on with their lives.

James has a country/classic rock band that has played the 4-state area for the past 16 years. If he's at home and doesn't have a guitar in his hand, we know he's sick! He is also a certified repair technician for about any music company you can think of and still finds time to fill in at the music store when they call and need another body. He is Kaylie's biggest fan and she his. He looks so funny out there shagging balls on the volleyball court some times I have to stop and laugh, but I couldn't be prouder of either of them.

I'm a little behind most of you in my career life. After high school I graduated college and continued worked part time for my mother's real estate and insurance office as I had done all the way through middle and high school. In 1993 I was diagnosed with breast cancer (I was 26) and had to have aggressive surgery and treatment. I used the experience to help my reconstruction doctor start a support group for breast cancer reconstruction patients out of the Springfield area and I started a breast cancer support group in Monett that I later opened up to all types of cancer through the American Cancer Society. These groups are still growing every day with newly diagnosed and they are getting younger and younger. Three years later the cancer was back and in my kidneys, liver and has since traveled to the bones, and brain. To make a long story short. Over the past 9 years we've fought for my life with just about every experimental chemotherapy drug any scientist can come up with from the Universities to the National Cancer Institute. (Thanks for all those lessons in chemicals Ms. Angle & Mr. Phillips - I didn't get it then, but I do now!!!) About two years ago the cancer was at it's worst and I went to New York for treatment at Sloan Kettering Cancer Institute and the treatment I started there has worked for a while now. (Living in Pierce City and Monett all my life I could only imagine New York City. Oh what a distorted image I had - I'll keep my small town values, thank you!!!)

Today - I am not cancer free and will never be, but we live our lives to the fullest. I say we because James, Kaylie & I live every day like it's our last. If we want to do something - we do it! If we have something on our mind - we say it! When we have a bad day - we pull together and make it through to the next! Everyone should do that, but they don't.

I have my real estate license and sell Pierce City & Monett property as the best place in the world to live and I truly believe that our parents chose a wonderful place for us to grow up. When we were young, we dreamed of leaving and in real estate, I see all the Pierce City and Monett graduates that move back HOME to raise their children or retire and I hear about where they've been living. This really is a great place to come back to! I look forward to seeing everyone at the reunion if I can.


Connie Meeks, Realtor