Gonzowrite

All you voyeurs out there want to know what I look like,,,, well now you know!

Yes, I know. You're thinking "How rude". Well, simply put, I'm too old and too rich to care about what anyone thinks or about being politically or socially "correct". But here's another picture which won't disturb your sensibilities;

That's me [before Lasik] standing in one of my Sabots next to my sailboat at Two Harbors, Catalina Island.

Born October 5th, 1940. Mom Virginia "Gino" Ellen Sanders & Dad Davol "Bob" Whittier Sanders [both since deceased]. Raised and lived in Glendale, California from 1940 till 1980. I went to Glenoaks Elementary School, Wilson Junior High [the old Wilson at Glendale High & the "new" Wilson], then Glendale High. If it wasn't for "Vocational Auto Shop" in High School [4 hours per day, 2 years] I would never have graduated [1959]. I even had the privilege of taking 7th grade twice!

Then, only to avoid the draft, I went to and got kicked out [low grades] of each of the following; Glendale College, Utah State University, Church College of Hawaii [now Brigham Young University, Hawaii] Los Angeles State College [now Cal State Los Angeles], & UCLA.

During the summers, weekends, and semesters when I wasn't in school I was, essentially, a surf bum at Malibu. I lived in my 1952 Chevy panel truck for 2 years in the parking lot of the County Line Cafe, now known as "Neptune's Net". I was a surf bum in Hawaii and lived in a shack with 9 other surfers [including Greg Noll, Dewey Weber, & Mickey Munoz]. I drove an ambulance back in Malibu.

When I wasn't at the beach I worked as a "hard rock" miner building the tunnel from what's now Lake Silverwood through the mountain [7 miles!] to San Bernardino, and I worked for the Forest Service on the Angeles National Forest.

When my 2S draft deferment finally got cancelled in 1965 and I got drafted but managed to "buy" my way out [don't ask how]. Remember, this was when Vietnam was just starting to "heat up" and I had no intention of being anyone's "cannon fodder". For the next 2 years, 1965 to 1967, I was truly, as we used to say at the beach, a "blithering derelict".

Then, in 1967 at the age of 27, I got "wisdom" and figured out there was no future in a "bum" career. So I enrolled at Valley State College [now California State University, Northridge]. I had no money and my sole possessions consisted of a few clothes, a mattress & sleeping bag, and my 1959 VW van.

I lived in that van, on campus, at the corner of Plummer & Lindley, as Valley State's only "on campus resident" for two years while I completed the course work for two Bachelor degrees in Psychology, "Innate Behavior" and "Human Factor Engineering", graduating in 1969 with a 3.9 GPA. I didn't have a dime to my name but managed to do it. Which is why I have absolutely no patience with kids today who whine about they can't go to college because they [or their parents] don't have the money. I did it, they can do it too.

After graduation I got my Real Estate License went into Real Estate in Glendale. I worked for Stevenson-Edwards Company and developed a "farm" in Glenoaks Canyon, Glendale. I was now living in our family home [my parents had moved to Fullerton] and I concentrated exclusively on selling and listing homes in the canyon. Ultimately I was doing exactly 50% of all the real estate business in the canyon, both selling and listing. That's when there were some 600 other real estate agents in Glendale. And that's when I started investing in homes and other income properties which is what got me to my financial position now.

After three years I'd had enough of the total lack of ethics among all the real estate people in the industry. They have no shame. So I switched careers and became a Los Angeles County Deputy Sheriff. I started while I was still in real estate as a "Reserve Deputy" [1971 - 1974], then went "regular", from March 18, 1974 until retirement on November 1st, 2000.

In the meantime, from the time of graduation in 1969 until the present, I did a lot of things. I learned to sail and bought several sailboats, the last one being "Cimba". I learned to fly and bought a number of airplanes. I built [all by myself!] a home in the Angeles National Forest and lived there for 15 years. I sold that house and moved back to "civilization" to one of my investment homes I already had in La Canada. I started going to Idaho in 1976, fell in love with the Sun Valley area, became a good elk hunter [if I may say so myself], and bought a home in Ketchum, Idaho. I still have it and go there for hiking/backpacking in the summer, skiing in the winter.

I've traveled the world, restored my home here in La Canada, and many other things that don't come to mind right now. At present I'm busy flying my plane, camping in my VW Westfalia "pop-top" camper, hiking & backpacking, checking off items one by one on my "bucket list", and hitting the gym/cardio daily.

Looking back on the whole thing, my "life experience", I've made only one mistake. Just one. That is in not getting married and having kids. Other than that, I wouldn't change a thing!



Carla, Dad, & Trent, about 1952	Front row, Mom, Grandma Florence, Cousin Trudy, Aunt Teresa. Back row; Aunt Frances, Dad, Trent, Uncle Mason, Cousin Phillip. About 1957	Gerard & Trent on Alta Peak, Sequoia, about 1955.