Cloudy, 59° F
(Aug. 7, 1947 -June 1, 2012)
After a long and hard fought 21-year struggle with cancer, Sandra Holland died quietly in her sleep on June 1, 2012, in her Oysterville, Wash., home near the ocean she loved so much. She was 64.
Her life was dedicated to helping people; thus Sandy chose a career in the mental health profession. She worked as a licensed clinical social worker in Maine for 20 years.
Sandy moved to Wyoming in 2000, where she worked another 10 years at Yellowstone Behavioral Health Center in Powell and Cody. Sandy helped hundreds of people to a better life by guiding her clients down a pathway where they would understand that inner child was controlling their lives, not the adult. Along the way Sandra also helped several mental health therapists to become much better in their chosen field.
Sandy was born in Boston then moved to Ohio at an early age, then to Nevada, California, Oregon, and back to California. She went to so many different schools through the eighth grade; she couldn’t remember all of them, before her family finally settled in Santa Rosa, Calif. She graduated from Santa Rosa High school in 1965, then attended San Francisco State where she earned a bachelor’s in social work and then went on to get a master’s at Sacramento State.
Sandy met her husband of 31 years, John Powell, at Thomas Edison Elementary School where she worked as a teacher’s aide in his fifth grade classroom, while getting her MSW. It was definitely love at first sight for both. They spent the winter of 1978 and 1979 traveling all over the western states, sleeping in a one ton Dodge van and skiing every ski resort they could find, at one point skiing 43 days in a row.
Then they went back to California, had a big yard sale, packed up what they had left in a 12-foot U-Haul trailer with a logo on the back stating “Adventure in Moving” and left for the East Coast on July 4, 1979, one driving the van pulling the trailer and the other driving Sandy’s 1967 MGB.
After an adventuresome 20 years in Maine, Sandy and John pulled up stakes and moved to Clark, settling into a two-story house with a massive rock fireplace and a gorgeous view of the Beartooth Mountains. John had built the home over a few years while going out to Wyoming for a month or two at a time. They have lived permanently in Wyoming for the past 12 years with excursions to Oysterville, Wash., where they built a second home by the ocean Sandy loved so dearly. Wyoming was just a bit too far away to see the ocean.
Sandy and her husband John had a life full of adventure and downright too much fun, with yearly winter trips to the Rocky Mountains for breathtaking runs through thigh deep champagne powder, camping excursions to the outrageously beautiful Nova Scotia and Newfoundland, not to mention several drives to lovely places up and down the Maine coast, plus voyages to many of the islands off the coast of Maine, then throwing in a few trips clear across the country to travel Highway 1 and 101 up and down the California, Oregon and Washington coastline. Sandy and John enjoyed a wonderful life.
A memorial service will be held on Aug. 7 at 11 am at the church in Old Oysterville, Wash. All are welcome to attend. Memorial donations in Sandy’s name can be made to your local no kill animal shelter. Inquire at buffmoon@nemont.net.
