'I Just Want to Make Him Proud and My Life to Count'

'I Just Want to Make Him Proud and My Life to Count'

By Samantha Boden

After a 50-year-long education journey, Kathryn Cook will be graduating from Cal State San Marcos this spring with a bachelor's degree in sociology. Photo by Ali Hoffman

This spring, at 76 years old, Kathryn Cook will be walking across the graduation stage as the oldest graduate of Cal State San Marcos' class of 2024.

Her path to this upcoming accomplishment was not one of a traditional four-year-and-done experience. In fact, it was 50 years in the making, with monumental life transitions and rocky hardships in between.

Her education journey kickstarted in 1965 at Grossmont College where she was part of the dental assisting program. It was here that she discovered the two loves of her life: her devotion to helping others in the healthcare industry and Ed.

Cook had met Ed at a group Bible study session.

"It was love at first sight," Cook said. "I looked across the room and saw his beautiful blue eyes and a smile that lit up everything around him. I told my parents that I had met the man I was going to marry, and they were like, 'Who is he? Where does he live?' I said, 'I don't know a thing about him.' We were married eighteen months later at 21 and 23."

For the next 20 years, Cook continued her career in the dental field with Ed by her side. It wasn't until they found themselves welcoming their daughter and son into the family after years of struggling with infertility that Cook decided to leave the industry. As she pivoted her focus to raising her children, she found little jobs for additional income. Ed was working for Navy housing as a carpenter at the time, and together, they would team up to work on projects with Ed building houses and Cook painting them.

As her children got older, Cook explored teaching opportunities and took on work as a special education and health aide. She was eventually introduced to Sharp HealthCare where she worked her way up to educator trainer, spending night shifts in the emergency room and training new hires for four hospitals.

Enjoying her time helping people learn, Cook decided she was ready to take the next step in her education journey and enrolled at MiraCosta College.

"I love teaching," Cook said. "I've done it all, and it's just so exciting to share your knowledge with another person. In 2008, I had finished up my classes for my associate degree, and Ed was so proud of me. I remember him saying, 'You have to walk,' and I said, 'No, I can't, I'll be the oldest person there.' And he just said, 'Well, that's OK.' So, I walked, and I felt like a little kid. It was very special. He gave me such confidence in myself."

Unfortunately, it was around this time that Ed started facing serious health issues. He underwent heart surgery and suffered a stroke, in addition to his diabetes that left him blind in one eye. Cook remained by his side, taking care of him each day, and supporting him through his falls that left him with fractures and the loss of appetite that caused him to lose his stature.

"It was a hard time," Cook said. "It was just one thing after another. But what a joy to be able to care for the one that you love, you know, your best friend in the whole entire world."

In November 2019, Ed passed away peacefully in his sleep.

"He had been in the hospital for the last week of his life," Cook said. "He was not fully conscious, but he knew I was there. The last thing he said to me was how much he loved me, our life and our children. But he said, 'I'm tired. I don't want to do this anymore.' I just grabbed his hand and said, 'That's OK.' The next day he was gone."

After Ed's passing, Cook was left to upend her idea of the future that she had envisioned for the past 51 years and begin anew. Feeling the need to give back to her community and mend her heart in the process, Cook threw herself into volunteer work at the San Diego Rescue Mission, winning an award for reaching 100 hours of service work.

As she started piecing together what the next chapter of her life was going to look like, she thought about her volunteer work and the stories the people at the homeless shelter shared with her. Wanting to learn more about social structures and matters of social justice, Cook looked into sociology programs at four-year universities.

She had lost two-thirds of her income due to Ed's retirement stopping after his death, so Cook was unsure of how to navigate the financial aspect. Her good friend encouraged her to fill out the FAFSA form to see if there were any grants available, and luckily, Cook was able to get most of her schooling covered.

In 2023, Cook enrolled in fully online courses at Cal State San Marcos as a sociology major.

"This education has given me such a better understanding of why things happen," Cook said. "It makes you aware and encourages you to go out and do something that will make a difference.

"And being mature or older, whichever phrase you want, can be good or bad. Just the thought of doing this made me so scared and excited at the same time. You know, people can make fun of you or think you're too old to learn. They may even think, 'Why are you bothering?' But for the most part, people in my life have just been so supportive and helpful. It's really encouraging."

As she is walking across the graduation stage and reminiscing about the trials and tribulations that she experienced along her education journey, she will be thinking of Ed.

"I just want to make him proud and my life to count," Cook said. "I know when I walk, he'll be watching over me and saying, 'Honey, I'm so proud of you.' He rarely called me by my name, it was really just 'Honey.' So, you know, I've done this for me and what I hope to do down the road, but also part of me did it for Ed, my greatest supporter."

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