Our first apartment was in the MSU Married Housing complex called Spartan Village, in the back, close to the laundry.  Our building became a gathering point for young church couples because Diane worked in the administrative office for Married Housing and did the assigning of applicants to apartments.  So over the three years we were there (September 1972 through May 1975) Diane arranged for us to be neighbors at times with Steve and Marilyn, Ron and Joyce, and Joe and Debbie.

When it was time to move, I was worried we would not be able to afford higher rent.  I had finished the Master’s degree, so we were no longer welcome in University housing.  The Yingers were living in an East Lansing duplex and they were urging us to move into the other side which had come open.  The standing joke when we would leave after visiting them was, “just think, if you lived next door, you’d be home by now.”  But the rent was going to double.  How could we afford it? Diane was also unemployed after finishing a one-year eighth-grade pregnancy-leave Middle-school teaching-job in Laingsburg  (sorry, the hyphens got away from me there).  The pregnancy leave baby was born, the teacher was returning, and we had no guarantee of continued employment. 

But God and Determined Diane found a way to make it work.  It turned out there was a fifth-grade job opening at the Laingsburg middle school, but the “successful applicant” had to have an elementary certificate.  Diane’s high school English and Journalism certificate worked for a one-year eighth grade gig, but no lower.  She checked with alma mater MSU who said it would take two years and another round of student teaching.  Discouraged Diane contacted other schools; Central Michigan promised they would grant the credential if she could take five classes and eighteen credits during the shortened summer term!  Delighted Diane agreed, got the job (provisionally), and we moved to Orchard Street.  

 A key component to class success was Diane’s childhood bicycle, a fat-wheeled, high handle-bar job that had seen better days. It was just right for riding on bumpy campus sidewalks and needed no lock since it was agedly unattractive.  For five weeks in June and July, Datsun-driving Diane made daily trips to Mount Pleasant, where she would park in a far-off lot, jump on the bike and ride to class.  At the end of the day, she would ride back to the car and drive home.  After the last day of class, she kissed that bike goodbye, and we have always hoped it was discovered by a worthy CMU undergrad.