b"What is the theatre class?We have a teacher that comes in and she give us information. She has different guests come in that are affiliatedwith theatre. She tells us what is out there to see. We decide what shows we want to see. On weeks we dont see a show,we have a guest speaker. My favorite show we went to was the Phantom of the Opera.What year did you retire?2006. I started in 1989 and I retired in 2006 at 63. I did 17 years. Can you tell me a little bit about where you grew up?I was born in Stovall, North Carolina. I graduated high school in Henderson, North Carolina. I have two brothers andone sister. My parents are deceased. They were farmers. I came to New York two years after I graduated when my motherpassed away. I was 19. My aunt was living in New York, in Long Island at the time. When I first came to New York, I wasmostly taking care of my cousin s kids at the time. Then later on, I started doing some daycare work and working at theLong Island University, downtown Brooklyn school, in the cafeteria. It was mostly part time because I had my daughter.And she went to college, Morgan State University in Baltimore, Maryland. She decided to stay.Is there anything else you want to discuss?I really enjoyed my work. It was one big family. There was always a celebration, someone getting married, someonehaving a baby. Everybody got along. The teachers were terrific.Sometimes we had end of the term parties. We would allget together and we go out and celebrate.But our main mission as school safety officers was to make sure we secured asafe environment for teachers to teach and student to learn. That's what we were there for. I think I did a good job. I gotdifferent awards and certificates, I remember when I first started, I got like a perfect attendance award for the first yearand then for three years straight. Before I retired, I took a month off to use up some of my sick time. Are you enjoying your retirement?When I first retired, I was waking up at the same time and I was like: Oh, my goodness, what am I going to dotoday? That was in August when I retired. It was September when I got this letter from the union about that classes thatwere going to start and I said: Oh, yes. And, I have been coming to the class ever since.Why did you retire? It sounds like you really enjoyed your job.I enjoyed my job, but my family was saying: Why don't you retire? I don't want you to get hurt on the job. Theywere concerned because things were changing. The kids were getting more aggressive. The administration changed andthey didn't have the control that the other principal had when he was there. Things started to get worse and they didn'twant me to get hurt. Some of the officers were getting seriously hurt. Have you made some friends and acquaintances at the union? Oh, yes. A lot of friends. Ive met a retired school safety officer in the classes. We compare notes about the job, different schools. I met a lot of people through the classes. 172 "