Granville Webster Burns – 50th Reunion Essay

Granville Webster Burns

webbburns@gmail.com

College: Pierson

For a long time, I’ve embraced living in the present. I look forward some; I look back less. When I do look back, I see that I’ve been very lucky. Things have generally gone my way, and the mistakes that I’ve made have been less costly than they could have been.

I was in NROTC at Yale, my way of paying for school and of avoiding the draft. I married almost immediately after graduation, and my wife and I were soon off to Japan where she lived and I visited occasionally. After a bit over two years, we moved to California to complete my naval service and then to attend law school.

Several years later, we decided to divorce, but the marriage had given us a wonderful daughter whom we both love very much. Now my daughter has a family of her own, including my teenaged grandson and granddaughter. He is looking at colleges, including Yale, while my granddaughter is just starting high school.

I remarried several years after my divorce, and that marriage has lasted. We have two sons, one just 30 and the other two years younger. Both are doing well. One is married and just had a son. The other is working in Hong Kong and traveling throughout Asia.

After 40 years in the legal business, I joined my wife in retirement. That has significantly reduced my stress and has given us the time to travel both in the US and abroad. I’ve also been able to focus more on photography, which I enjoy because it allows me to record my travels and experiences. If the pictures can convey to others the emotion I felt when I pressed the shutter, so much the better. Some of the pictures apparently have, and have been accepted in juried contests, though no winners yet.

I haven’t kept up with my friends from Yale. To all of you, “Hello,” and I hope that you are doing well and are as happy as I am.