For those of us who have known Carol Katsanis for a very, very long time, we have come to both accept and expect the unexpected. If she could have told us 46 years ago what her life plans included, those plans were set aside the day she met Jack Varnado.

She was on her way to a friend's house when she saw Jack sitting on his front doorstep. She blew her car horn; he waved her over; and things just changed. They had gone to Colton and Nicholls together and had even been named the wittiest couple in our class. Until that day, however, they hadn't really talked. So talk they did.

It wasn’t too long after that, Carol said, that Jack invited her to see a Nicholls football game played by the 1962 team. On June 22, 1963, Carol and Jack were married.

Carol worked for a while after she finished business school. Jack joined the Army Reserve and worked interim jobs until he could join the New Orleans Fire Department.

Carol stayed home with the children, Rodney, born in July 1968, and Brian, born in February 1970. Carol and Jack lost Brian in an automobile accident in 1994, just five months after Brian's son, Jonathan, was born. Rodney's son, Kevin, was born in April 1985.

Carol and Jack lived in New Orleans East before moving to Slidell in 1986. After an injury on the job, Jack retired from the fire department as a captain in 1989. For several years the couple worked as travel agents before turning all their spare time toward volunteering at Slidell Memorial Hospital.

Jack's death in November 2008 has left a hole in Carol's heart, but she is especially close to her grandchildren and was very pleased when young Kevin joined the fire department to follow in his grandfather's footsteps. Carol still volunteers at the hospital while she waits to see where life will take her next.

Carol was the driving force behind our class picnics. She loves seeing old friends, although she admits her favorite part of high school was 3:15 p.m. every day.