My wife Cherise was born in a small town in Ohio. Since her father was a pilot who took jobs all over the country, she attended seven different schools before graduating from high school in Austin in 1984. Going straight from high school into the workplace, she was promoted to management at McDonald's just four months after starting. I got to know Cherise while taking part in her management training, and we began dating soon afterwards. We married in January, 1986, while she was attending business school and I was at the University of Texas. She graduated the following year, but was unable to find office work due to a slowdown in the Texas economy. She worked various odd jobs until she landed a temporary manufacturing job at IBM, which she leveraged into a permanent job at a large pharmaceutical company. Five years later, tired of working the graveyard shift, she finally got an office job at an Austin insurance company. Her experience there led her to the dental field, where she worked both in the front office and in the back assisting the doctor. She's currently enjoying life as a homemaker while working part time.
Cherise has always loved to sing, and has taken voice lessons from graduate voice students at the University of Texas. She had previously sung alto in church choirs, but during the course of her lessons discovered she was actually a soprano (she can sing a high C with ease, and can hit the high F's required in Mozart's "Queen of the Night" aria. She hasn't sung the aria, but if she ever did, she's got the F's). She built up an impressive repertoire of solo sacred music, several of which she sang in church: Faure's Expectans (from the Christmas Oratorio), Mozart's Alleluia, and Ned Rorem's very-tough-to-sing Psalm 148(Cool piece! Click here to hear it on MIDI).
Cherise also loves playing handbells, reading, playing with our cats, watching Star Trek Voyager and anything else with Kate Mulgrew in it, and flying with her dad.
My wife Cherise was born in a small town in Ohio. Since her father was a pilot who took jobs all over the country, she attended seven different schools before graduating from high school in Austin in 1984. Going straight from high school into the workplace, she was promoted to management at McDonald's just four months after starting. I got to know Cherise while taking part in her management training, and we began dating soon afterwards. We married in January, 1986, while she was attending business school and I was at the University of Texas. She graduated the following year, but was unable to find office work due to a slowdown in the Texas economy. She worked various odd jobs until she landed a temporary manufacturing job at IBM, which she leveraged into a permanent job at a large pharmaceutical company. Five years later, tired of working the graveyard shift, she finally got an office job at an Austin insurance company. Her experience there led her to the dental field, where she worked both in the front office and in the back assisting the doctor. She's currently enjoying life as a homemaker while working part time.
