“Honey, you’ve just got to pay your dues,” country music legend Kitty Wells once said to Denise Law. Her advice has been ringing true ever since. DENISE WAS born into a family of 10 children in 1952. She turns 61 this summer. SHE MOVED to Iola, where she began the GED program at ACC. THE ACC GED graduates will walk the stage at 7:30 p.m. Monday in the ACC gymnasium. Denise will address the 2013 graduates from the podium.
At the time, Wells was referring to Denise’s country music career that she had started in Nashville. Her band was called Denise and The Whippoorwills. That advice would translate to many other areas of her life as she would find out.
On Monday, Denise will address the 2013 class of GED recipients at Allen Community College. She is one of them.
“You can be successful at anything if you really want it bad enough,” Denise said. One of her General Equivalency Degree instructors, Julia Martin, sat across the table from her in the adult-education area of the college.
She reflected on the hard journey she has undertaken to get the piece of paper she will be holding in her hand on Monday. It’s a story of resilience.
She grew up in Ripley, N.Y. Her father was a truck driver, and didn’t have much time to care for the whole family. What little schooling Denise received came from many different outlets.
“I must’ve gone to over 20 different schools as a kid,” she said with an uneasy smile.
That didn’t last for long.
Her father took her out of classes intermittently to babysit her nine siblings. She said she had trouble keeping up with the schoolwork as it was. Then, her father took her out of classes for good in the sixth grade.
As the third oldest child, she was responsible for caring for many of the members of her family, especially since her older sister married at 15. Denise married her first husband when she was 16.
From there, life took hold, as it goes. Denise spent her time caring for her children and working different jobs that didn’t require a high-school diploma — factories, waitressing jobs and babysitting.
In the 1980s, Denise spent time working on her country music career — she is a talented singer. She recorded several songs with her band in Nashville.
“The songs were ‘No Easy Way Down’ and ‘I Like Cowboys the Best,’” she laughed. Life on the road, and in the bars, however, had a negative effect on her home life and she decided to move in a different direction.
Her family had moved to Garnett when she was younger, and that is where she opened a restaurant, called Denise’s Country Cafe. Her second husband passed away in 2004, from a heart attack.
She latered remarried to her current husband, Gene Law, and they have been married for nine years. While her restaurant was successful, Denise said she was tired and needed a change.
“I was tired of struggling, I just wasn’t getting anywhere,” she said.
Though Denise said she had “done a little bit of everything” in her different careers, she didn’t have “that piece of paper” to get her foot in the door. While she had a lot of experience, she received nothing but rejection from potential employers.
“They would say, ‘come back and see us when you have a diploma,’” Denise said.
So, she took charge and enrolled in the program — not without some trepidation.
“I had never heard of geometry or algebra,” she said of her first day sitting in the classroom. “I almost left the class that day.”
“But then I told myself that I wanted my degree that bad.”
So she went to work.
With the help of her teachers, Denise pushed through the depression and frustrations that came with re-educating herself after 46 out of the classroom. Now, after a year and a half, she will walk across the stage.
“If it wasn’t for my teachers, I couldn’t have done it,” she said. Her husband and former employers at Diebolt Lumber were there to support her as well.
“He (Gene) has been the best husband ever,” Denise said.
Denise said she has discovered more about herself than she ever thought she would through the program.
“It’s something I never thought I would achieve. I found out I was smarter in science than anything else,” she said. “I’m very proud of myself.”
Now, five of Denise’s 10 siblings have gone back to get their high school diplomas — none of them attended high school as adolescents. Denise said she is going to hit the ground running after Monday, to find a job. She said she never would have guessed she’d be where she is now.
“You’ve got to be there for yourself,” she said. “Times are very hard.”
As she moved to get up from the table, she mentioned she’d heard that people in their 100s had gone back to get their high-school diploma — it reinforced the idea that it’s better-late-than-never for education in her mind.
“I wanted to make something of my life,” Denise said.
Maybe that “piece of paper” will help her achieve that goal. After all, she has paid her dues.
Grad pays her dues
