At 17 years old I moved back to California. My Dad was living in Ridgecrest Ca, at the time so that is where I wound up for the next couple of years. For those of you who don't know...Ridgecrest is right smack dab in the middle of the Mojave Desert! HEAT!!! My Dad (Clyde) taught me to lay floor covering for a living and that is what I did off and on for the next several years. It was during this time that I first tried smoking a pipe. My Stepbrother was experimenting with pipes and I decided to give them a try. I went to the Thrifty Drug Store in Ridgecrest and bought two pipes. The first one was a Dr. Grabow (Omega) and the second was a Mastercraft (Bent Clay). I bought two different tobaccos. The first was Captain Black Regular (White Pouch), and the second was Borkum Riff Cherry Cavendish. I tried and liked them ok but at the time I was a full fledged cigarette smoker so I never really made the switch. I then went into farming and continued to occasionally smoke the pipe for years.
I was married in December of 1991 to my Sweetie Pie (Margaret) and began to smoke the pipe more often. She would encourage it because her Dad smoked the pipe. I moved back to Bakersfield because she wasn't cut out to be a Farmer's wife, besides she had a house there. Finding myself now unemployed for the first time in years, I decided to go to Security Training School. For the next six years, I was an armed guard. (No Jokes Please :o)) During that time I would continue smoking the pipe. My collection began to grow...Mostly cheap pipes. The kind found at Drug Stores. I was a die hard Half & Half man by that time. It was the only tobacco I could find that I could inhale...I still smoked cigarettes as well.
THE CHANGE
In March of 1995 I came to know Jesus Christ as Lord and Savior of my life. It was then I quit drinking and smoking. I have since taken up the pipe again, although I don't inhale it any more...Thank You Very Much!!
My collection of pipes has grown.. This time with better quality Pipes. I am living in Portland Oregon again working for my Sister and Brother-in-Law's Construction Company. I have a simple life, with not so simple a hobby in Pipe Collecting...I look forward to each day not knowing what the Lord will bring my way, but still knowing that he loves me.
