The Life of Gayl Gentile --- So Far
The Life of Gayl Gentile --- So Far
You may not remember who I am as I was very shy and unassertive when I was in LAHS. I was raised rather traditionally for the fifties – which means that I was repressed a lot and could not express my individuality at home or at high school. Although I got good grades at Lansdowne-Aldan, it was not as if I was all that bright – it was just that I had learned to brown-nose the teachers. Proof: I did rather poorly my first two years at Temple University as the classes were too large for the teachers to notice anyone. Luckily by my junior year in college, the classes got smaller and I got better grades.
I became an elementary school teacher (just like my mother) and continued to live at home until, at the age of twenty-five, I got married simply because I was getting too old to be single (according to the times). Immediately after the birth of our second daughter (which incidentally was on May 7, 1971 – the exact same day as when LAHS ’56 celebrated its 15th anniversary), my husband deserted me for another woman. Of course, at first, I was devastated but as soon as I realized what a gift that man had given me (my freedom from confinement!), I rejoiced and celebrated! This was in the beginning of the time when old traditions were being turned upside down and inside out! Freedom of _expression for women (in ALL avenues) was rampant in this new world that I had just discovered. There was a social revolution going on and I joined it! I had already had my one and only marriage (so I thought) and I had already had the only children that I ever wanted; I was thirty-four years old and suddenly found the world was my oyster!!! I no longer had to listen to any more dictators (my husband, my parents, my teachers, etc). I reinvented myself and started living MY life.
During this time, I participated in many new-age personal growth seminars; I made a lot of new friends; I dated a lot; I took a sabbatical leave of absence and lived one year in Paris along with my two young daughters; I traveled to Japan with my kids; I jogged regularly and even ran a marathon; and I kept on discovering new characteristics of the real responsible Gayl!
In the mid-seventies, I met the MacDiarmid family who lived not far from me. I became and remained very good friends with them throughout the years. After Marian (the wife) sadly died in early 1990. I helped Alan (the widower) with the myriad amount of paperwork that had accumulated in his household. Little by little, I spent more time in his house and by the end of 1991, I moved in with him and became his life partner. (By the way, also in 1991, I happily retired, with full pension, from teaching elementary school in the City of Philadelphia – after more than 30 straight years!)
Alan is a chemistry professor at the University of Pennsylvania. In 1975, he had made an astounding discovery. He found out that if you dope certain polymers with a certain substance, you change the plastic from becoming an insulator to a conductor of electricity. This new plastic is now called a synthetic metal. Due to this discovery, Alan was awarded the Nobel Prize in Chemistry in 2000. Our lives, which were very busy before 2000, became twelve times busier! We had traveled for conferences in the past; now we are overseas for presentations and meetings more than we are home
Alan has four children and nine grandchildren. My two daughters are married; I have no grandchildren. I continue to manage his paper work and he continues to create new paper work.
After “shacking-up” for fourteen years, on June 5, 2005, Alan MacDiarmid and Gayl Gentile got married and are living happily ever after.
[Gayl P. Gentile, 635 Drexel Avenue, Drexel Hill, PA
610-623-0577; anagly@aol.com]