You plan for your future.
Build a home. Raise a family. Then, one day, your job is done.
Bob and Kathy Vaughan moved to Colorado in 1976 and built themselves a log home in Soda Creek, near Evergreen.
Snow can seem pleasant, even harmless, until of course, you’re searching for a hidden driveway, which is actually a quarter-mile winding road that leads up the side of a mountain.
“We brought a daughter and new granddaughter home from a Denver hospital, born in December, during the 1982 snowstorm,” Bob reminisces. “Interstate 70 was closed at the Morrison exit and we had to take the canyon road up to Evergreen to our home on the mountain. Our old 4-wheel drive pickup, with chains on all 4 wheels, got us there after a whole bunch of scares.”
Well, all that snow finally hastened a move to safer ground in Morrison “after all the kids were gone – married and off to college.”
That newborn granddaughter they drove on that perilous day is about to give Bob and Kathy their first great- grandchild. And Bob, who retired from IBM with 40 years of service, is about to retire from Colorado.
“I had a pretty high-level management position with IBM,” Bob says. “One day they told me: Pick where you would like to live. Take seven trips anywhere in the country and figure it out.”
This gesture was met with welcome relief by the Vaughan family, particularly Kathy, who until that time had led a nomadic existence
“As Kathy likes to recall, we moved something like 32 times with IBM. She still says that IBM means ‘I’ve Been Moved,”‘ Bob says, laughing. “But in those days, when you were offered a promotion, you took it – or you may not be offered it again.”
Because both his sons had attended YMCA camps in Colorado and loved it, Bob “decided to look at Colorado … and I didn’t need to look any further.”
At 73, Bob is still happy with his choice.
In fine health, despite two previous back surgeries and one hip replacement, Bob loves to play golf and still hunts deer and elk.
Kathy, on the other hand, recently had open-heart surgery and experienced complications. The altitude has made it increasingly difficult for her to breathe. Her doctors recommend they move.
They’ll be moving to Florida, back to where their life together began.
Kathy and Bob met in Miami in 1952, where he was serving in the Coast Guard.
“She ended up supporting us through college at Florida State – though I did have an athletic scholarship – by working at the state of Florida government for $200 per month, which seemed like a fortune at the time,” Bob explains.
The couple met at a ballpark while he was playing semi-pro baseball.
“Scouts were trying to sign me to a professional baseball contract but I decided I wanted to get an education first,” Bob says. “That’s when Florida State offered me a scholarship.”
Bob’s brother had played Triple-A ball and warned him that “unless you get some kind of indication that you can get up to the bigs, it’s gonna be tough.”
Bob agreed. But he has no regrets. The choice led to a successful career, a wonderful family and Colorado.
“We’ve been here for all those years, lots of friends,” Bob says of his Colorado experience. And though Florida is saturated with top-notch golf courses, Bob isn’t exactly excited about leaving his home in Morrison.
“We’ve accumulated a lot of stuff,” Bob says. “Going through these things brings up a lot of memories. We have literally thousands of photographs of our children we need to go through. We took four boxes and we’re shuffling them like playing cards.”
The Vaughan house, which lies “right where the mountains begin,” will sell this week or next. “We’ve had a lot of good memories here,” Bob says. “The changes we’ve seen made in Denver have all been wonderful. A great 20-something years.”
We should all be so lucky.
David Harsanyi’s column appears Monday and Thursday. Reach him at 303-820-1255 or dharsanyi@denverpost.com.
