James [Jim] Lewis Jr. James R. Lewis

After high school I wandered around U of L approx 6 years (and did a lot of running around Okolona) before deciding to become a registered nurse. Nursing and a friend led me to Los Angeles where I worked in the neuro-trauma intensive care unit at UCLA. UCLA was the greatest nursing and patient care-giving experience for me. I provided care, along with my colleagues, to patients in the worst conditions. Some survived while others didn't. I learned that the body performs the healing process while nurses, doctors and all the health care delivery team support the healing process with the latest healing knowledge available.

While in LA I fostered the Country & Western dance bug which I had caught while still in Louisville, and carried this with me to Boston, MA. I moved to Boston to attend graduate school. Post-graduate school I started a small business called the Silver Spur Dance productions which lasted every bit of one dance. I wisely determined after a log of hard work, that C&W had already peaked and was on its decline, and so I turned my career focus back to health care.

in 1996 I became a Case Manager at the St. Elizabeth's Medical Center in Boston, and then was hired in 2001 as the IPA Administrator for a 300 physician association affiliated with St. Elizabeth's.

Currently I am the Director of Performance Initiatives for the Caritas Christi Health Care System in Boston. I believe in the availability of health care for all citizens of a high-functioning society as we live in, and it being provided with the highest quality and in the most efficient manner available.

All my family continues to live in Louisville. My mother continues to live in Okolona while my father and his wife are off Bardstown Rd just outside of Ferncreek.

Having played in the Southern High School band for 6 years, and probably the only band member to have ever accomplished this (and not because I failed a grade either), I still enjoy music by playing the violin today, as well as an iPOD. I stay in regular contact with Doug Murray, so if anyone is looking for the guy let me know and I can hook you up.

Oh yeah, for all those folks who knew me as quiet or shy, or aloof, or a late bloomer, I finally figured out I have a good case of social anxiety which I continue to work on to today.

Oh, what do you say for a school story, except the obvious. I have probably had the worse case of shyness during high school which I later learned was a social anxiety. While I wouldn't want to do the thing over again, I would liked to have done things quite differently. I wished I had taken the time to get to know many of you who I never did meet, and would have taken the time to know others better than I did.

Without mentioning any names there were a group of folks whom I think of primarily whom I knew from the time of John Filson elementary (3rd grade and Mrs. Brewers class) all the way through Southern High.

As the years went by at Southern I fell out of touch with most of you while at the same time making friends with a few others. All of those who lived around the Miles lane area, Cooper avenue and Cherry Village, and others.

For those familiar with the informal nickname of 'the band', I spent most of my time hanging around those who played in the band, and attended most all of the home basketball and football games. Hell, not most, I mean all of them from 7th through 12th grade, it was required, but it was fun also. I loved playing the fight song during the basketball games, and listening to the drum section drive the beat during our marches at band camp. I also loved playing the Theme from Shaft at those basketball games because I thought it was the closest rendition of any tune we played to its original sound.

During my senior year Rusty Patterson and I had the opportunity to play a trumpet duet as part of our marching band show which we played during the football games and at our competitions. That was both exciting and an honor. Oddly enough I haven't played the trumpet since high school.

I had a crush on one particular young lady during my junior and senior year of whom I was never able to speak to due to my shyness. That is a sweet memory.

I'd like to thank all for your friendships both then and now and would like to wish you a great reunion!

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