When George started Harrison High School in Chicago, he was given a list of activities that included band. Band sounded like fun, so with no prior musical training, he marched into the band room and said "I want to join the band". He was given a French horn and a beginner French horn book. After 2 years, Harrison got a new band director who suggested George and the band would be happier if he played baritone. Even though he wasn't very good, he really enjoyed band and tried to play every instrument he could borrow. He learned to play scales and simple music on trumpet, clarinet, and saxophone.In elementary school, he had decided he wanted to be a chemist. He started at the University of Illinois campus on Navy Pier in Chicago to study chemistry. After 3 semesters, circumstances required he quit school and go to work. He got a job as a chemical lab technician at Simonize Company. Then he moved to a similar position at Amoco Chemicals. While working fulltime he attended night classes at several colleges finally getting his BS in chemistry from Roosevelt University 11 years after his high school graduation. Concurrently he married Margaret Sheridan of Ottawa, Illinois. She received a BS in Scientific Writing from Illinois Institute of Technology and she played trumpet in high school. (Maybe we will see her in the band someday). In 1968, they were blessed with daughter Elaine, and in 1987 daughter Becky.
After graduation, he moved into Chemicals Technical Service at Amoco Chemicals. After six years in the lab, he moved into marketing. Amoco brought him to Alpharetta in 1990, and his job morphed into a combination of technical writer and search engine marketing specialist with some website development thrown in for good measure. Then Amoco was acquired by BP, and then the polymer division was sold to Solvay, a Belgian chemicals and pharmaceutical conglomerate. So he worked for three companies without leaving the building, and retired from Solvay in late 2009 after 45 years.
Although George hadn't played in a band since high school, he always played around with music, and couldn’t resist buying used instruments in music stores. We had a couple of cornets, a clarinet, a tambourine, and two or three guitars. George's daughter Elaine has played trumpet since grade school, and joined the Alpharetta City Band and the Sounds of Sawnee in Cumming. When the Alpharetta band needed a baritone player, she started nagging George to join the bands with her. He told her he would if she got him a baritone horn. So Elaine and her younger sister Becky found and bid on a used King baritone on E-bay. It cost $175 and shipped from Arizona to Atlanta by Greyhound bus. After a year and a half in both bands, George was enjoying it enough to spend his next work bonus on a new Bach euphonium.
After retiring, he was looking for something to keep him busy, so he became a volunteer at the Georgia Aquarium and joined the East Cobb New Horizons Band. Shortly thereafter, he joined the Southern Winds, and when a fellow baritone player needed company, the Sandy Springs New Horizons Band, which brings his total to five bands. Handling all the holiday concerts for all of them has been a challenge.
He square dances with Margaret with the Dudes 'n Darlins. The Cekis family are also tropical fish hobbyists with 50 aquariums in their home. Some of their fish can be seen at www.cekiscichlids.com.