GMC Western States
	Newsletter Number 41 - June 15, 2000

President's Message

For several months I have been thinking I should make some comments about our wives and their role in this club, and with Mothers' Day having just occurred on May 14, now seems to be an appropriate time to make these comments, even though I realize it will be June by the time the Newsletter reaches our membership. For many of our families owning, operating, and keeping our GMC's going is to a great extent the hobbyhorse of the male component in the family. Guys just like to look at, talk about, and mechanically do things with vehicles. For some it allows them to experience again the glory days of youth when they may have fixed up old cars, run dragsters, lowered rear ends, souped up, and polished to perfection that first car they got so they could impress the girls.
And now our girls (our wives) truck all over the country with us, go to GMC meets, patiently listen to our talk of 3.42's versus 3.55's and similar subjects, and the absolute need for our purchase of the latest modification to our vehicles. For some of our women, they are just as involved with GMC's as the fellows, but for many, I suspect they are patiently, willingly and in fact happy to go along with their guy knowing he is happy in this pursuit, and if he is contented, then she is also contented. I sometimes wonder would I be willing to travel all over the country going to, for example, gardening clubs? Much as I like gardening, I have to admit it is currently more Donna's passion than mine, so would I be willing to spend that kind of time, money, and involvement following her interest? (She does in fact get quite a few gardening magazines, but that of course is a far cry from some GMC mods).
I'm not sure, but maybe that is one of the strengths of the female psyche of our women: how they are able to be supporters, nurturers, and hang out with us guys as we pursue our interests. I do know one thing for sure. And that is that our wives are very, very important in our lives whether we tell them so or not. One just has to look at the statistics. When we are not married we fellows have much higher levels of depression, suicide, and sickness than if we are married. (For you single fellows out there - sorry about that!) The facts are simply that we fellows do a lot better having a wife, and I think it is pretty fantastic that all you gals so gracefully work around our various shenanigans and keep a smile on your faces. So from all of us guys, even though we may not express it very well, or often, you enrich, warm, and make meaningful our lives, and sometimes we take you for granted, not fully realizing it until you are not there, just how important you are to us. So here is a big hug from all of us.
For those of us who made it to our spring Roundup at Ukiah under the planning of Roy and Ellamae Platz and the leadership of Allan and Miki Singleton, we all experienced a walloping good time. The food, the events - everything - seemed to be just really good and was certainly enjoyed by us all. Thanks everyone. The sad note was that Roy along with Ellamae, who had been planning this event for so long, were not able to enjoy the fruits of their work, because Roy became very sick with cancer a short time before the Roundup, was hospitalized and passed away during the event. We all felt that sadness, but especially Al and Miki who had worked so closely with them, but they very ably picked up the ball and carried it well. More will be expressed further in the Newsletter about this.
In the area of personnel, we have changes and additions with Mike Cherry taking the place of John Lamb for the Arizona/ Utah state Rep. John is doing a lot of traveling this year, so is not very available, thus the need for replacing. And Kerry Tandy has volunteered to represent Idaho/Montana. To give some help to Marc and Lillian Trubert, our Editors, another family who has been in the club for a long time has agreed to be ROVING REPORTERS - Barbara and Larry Frear. So in the future we can expect to see some Newsletter articles under their penmanship, or is it computership now?

Claude Brousson

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