Shar and Alan met at a group golf outing in 2019 and shortly thereafter began dating. They joined households in 2020 and confirmed their love for each other, during Covid, traveling back and forth between Shar’s home in Lake Norman, North Carolina and Alan’s home in Johns Island, South Carolina.
When it came time to forgo the commute and explore where they wanted to settle, they owned two properties each, spanning Wilmington, NC, Lake Norman and Johns Island, which were all great choices. As they compared notes and visited each location, Shar suggested considering Seabrook Island, SC. Prior to his passing Ken, Shar’s husband of 42 years, and her family visited SI many times, starting with an evacuation for Hurricane Hugo in 1989. Although Alan had played golf here many times, he had never really explored the island, so after a long weekend on the island the choice quickly became a no-brainer.
They moved to the island in December of 2021. Along the way they also got married in October of 2022.
Shortly after settling into their new home, a neighbor and now dear friend, Gloria Wilson invited Shar and Alan to attend a Seabrook Island Birders program. It was their first program, with the speaker being Scott Weidensaul.
Shar has been an avid backyard birder since adolescence and in no time joined as a Shorebird Steward. She has since become the leader of the Learning Together on Seabrook Island Golf Courses activity and regularly helps out on the Hospitality Committee.
Shar worked many years in the banking industry encompassing branch management and lending operations. She traveled extensively and lived in Paris, France for two years.
Alan has always enjoyed sighting birds but is truly a newcomer to watching, learning and protecting birds. His engagement with Seabrook Island Birders started at that first program, when he volunteered to help Nancy Brown out recording our programs. Soon thereafter he was helping Mary Wilde with programs and became a member of our Board of Directors.
As an aside, on Shar’s first outing as a steward, 3 years ago, Alan decided to dust off his old Nikon D7100, accompany her to the beach and see if he could catch a few good pics. On that day we got one of our best pictures of U5. Well, 3 camera’s later and with much more than enough photography equipment, Alan and Shar are now members of the Seabrook Island Photography Club where Alan is the Secretary and serves on the Technology Committee. Shar is quickly becoming an avid iPhone photographer.
Alan worked in high tech since he was eighteen years old, spanning programmer to CEO of a successful startup. He is now lending his tech skills to the Seabrook Island Birders, serving in the role of Webmaster and is currently architecting a new club website with a target launch by mid 2025. He is also co-chair of the Programs Committee with Mary Wilde and Vice President of the club.
Along with many passions including domestic and world travel, spending time with family in NC, Orlando, Seattle and Boston, golf, cooking at home, photography and good wine, birding ranks right at the top. Although Shar and Alan are never going to be expert birders, not enough years left, they strive to be an integral part of the club’s mission to help others become birders, to whatever level they strive to be, and to support the preservation of the great habitat surrounding us.
Written by Alan Fink