Joy Williams Dawson

I stayed in Southern Illinois in the Carterville / Carbondale area after graduation. I attended John A. Logan college on a basketball scholarship for one year. That was long enough to determine a life of basketball wasn't for me. I stayed in school for another year or so. In 1996 I began working at Blue Cross Blue Shield of Illinois in Marion. In early 2003 I moved back to WF for almost a year before moving to a northwest suburb of the Chicago area. I transfered to the Blue Cross Blue Shield headquarters office that is in downtown Chicago. I never would have thought that I would be living and working in a big city. Until recently moving closer to the city, I had a 2 hour commute to and from work each day. That is definitely a change from Southern Illinois.

My divorce was finalized yesterday (09/11). Halelujia!! I'm a free woman! I cannot begin to tell you how excited I am about that!! I recently rented an apartment that is closer to the city where I plan to live for quite a while by myself. Please shoot me if I mention anyone moving in with me, me moving in with anyone else, or getting married anytime soon. LOL! I need and want my time alone for a while.

I am dating a great guy named John, a really sweet person who came into my life at the right time. We're still in the "getting to know each other" phase of our relationship and taking things very slow, which is what I need right now. We are having a great time traveling together. We took a vacation to New Orleans in July and just got back from Cancun, Mexico this past week. Both trips were great and I'm already looking forward to the next one in March. We have also traveled to different locations in Ohio, Indiana and Kentucky. This is a whole new exciting life for me and I'm loving every minute of it. It's great having my life back again and being able to enjoy it with someone that has similar interests.

Thanks Kellie and Kristen for bringing back the memory of my two left shoes at the Centralia basketball game. I remember that like it was yesterday.... You two along with the rest of the team telling me to shove my right foot into a left shoe and act like it was normal. ha ha. I remember everyone scrambling around trying to find me a pair of shoes to play the game in. I ended up stylin' that night in a pair of 1970 something Chuck Taylor's that I could feel every speck of dirt on the floor through the sole. Everybody was laughing, including me. I think they were just jealous. ha ha!