Debbie G.

I grew up on what was the rural edge of Los Angeles and is now in the center of the megalopolis. When I was young, we were always outdoors. Our house was built in a walnut grove, and we loved to climb the trees and pretend. Our parents made it possible for us take full advantage of the active life that Southern California offered: swimming, body surfing, hiking, horseback-riding, snow skiing, tennis, and playing outside nearly every single day.

In college at Berkeley, being close to the sublime Sierra Nevada and heartbreaking Point Reyes made it a snap to get to the backcountry for a long weekend, and I got very into backpacking. At 20, I went to Paris to study at the Sorbonne for a semester, fell in love with 17th century painting and decided to major in Art History. I had always been into art. In high school I took studio classes, so Art History was not out of the blue. I spent the summer of 1976 as an intern at the Guggenheim Museum in NYC, subletting a room in a squalid basement apartment with the windows nailed shut, yet was seduced by the exotic urbanity of the East Coast art world. It was an amazing summer to be in NY, because of all the Bi-Centennial events.

 My husband Jim and I met in grad school at Penn at a Fine Arts happy hour. We took wonderful wilderness trips together, usually combining them with visits to my family in LA and then a drive north to the Sierra Nevada for a backpacking trip. Our honeymoon was a ski trip to idyllic Sun Valley, Idaho. How could I know then that I would spend 10 years taking business trips to a very different Idaho to meet with regulators at a hazardous and toxic waste treatment facility built on a former Titan missile base that my company was in the process of making as safe as possible under fairly recently enacted environmental laws? (Someone in the 1970’s thought it was a smart idea to dump toxic waste down unused missile silos.)

I ended up in Philly, because after the Guggenheim experience, I attended grad school in History of Art at Penn where I was awarded a full tuition and living expenses fellowship, and later was a teaching fellow. I completed my master’s degree, and eventually decided to leave my graduate program before writing my dissertation.

When Jim and I married at age 26, I decided to pursue a more practical career, went to Villanova Law School, and have enjoyed being a lawyer since 1984. I retired from practice in 2020 and am happy to be able to spend lots of time with my grandchildren.

  I loved raising my two sons and seeing things through their eyes. We enjoyed summer family vacations in California and the National Parks there and close by, and winter trips to visit my in-laws at the beach in Florida. Recently, I became the grandmother of two and that is just the best.

In May 2016, I went for my routine mammo, which led to an ultrasound, then an MRI and, next, a needle biopsy. All were inconclusive—even the biopsy! My surgeon assured me that she did not suspect breast cancer but said the mass had to be removed, because all the tests were inconclusive. I had a lumpectomy and 5 days went by and I did not hear from the doctor, although I called her. My friends and family were bugging me. Why couldn’t I find out?!?! I assumed that the mass was benign and she was dealing with cancer patients. It turned out that I had a cancerous tumor that was encased in cysts, which was why the diagnosis was so elusive.

Hope Afloat is one of the best things that ever happened to me! I love my beautiful, strong teammates. I love evening practices on the Schuylkill—the tougher the better! I love squeezing that last ounce of effort out of myself. I love carpool rides with teammates when we catch up on every little thing and solve every problem. I love Hope Afloat!