Terrence Hart (Tragedies and Triumphs)

Terrence Oskar Hart (b. 28 August 1954) is an American businessman known as the father of Kimberly Hart, former Pink Ranger.

Biography
Terrence was born in Milwaukee, Wisconsin, and spent the first thirteen years of his life in Brookfield, Wisconsin before his parents moved to Hollywood, Florida. His parents, Gerard and Gerthe Hart, moved to the United States from the Munich region of Bavaria, Germany in 1950; he is their only child.

Terrence was a fairly good student and a good sportsman but something of an introvert; he much preferred hiking, fishing, hunting and solo track-and-field events to stereotypical "team" sports, making him somewhat of a loner as a child. He was fascinated by his father's annual hunting and coursing trips to Lorraine, France with a rather elite Franco-German team and began accompanying his father at age fourteen, becoming a full-fledged member - technically a German national, with a French hunting license - by age sixteen.

Hoping to get their son "out and about" a bit more, his parents transferred him - despite their hesitation - from his tight-knit Catholic school to a larger and more anonymous public school after fifth grade, but this did not widen his social horizons and they worried that he was a bit of a snob toward his classmates, whom he described as "silly" and "gruff," even (especially) most of the regular hunters. Even so, privately his father tended to agree, despite having himself hunted for years in Europe.

When the family moved to Florida, Terrence was sent back to Catholic school and made a few (though not especially close) friends to get himself through high school. Missing the cold, opted to attend Seattle Pacific University, a Catholic school, much to the surprise of his parents, who had never detected in their son a deep religiosity beyond respect for the formalities and structures.

At SeaPac, Terrence majored in accounting and met Kristen "Kris" Boutin, a Clothing and Textiles major in the same year as he. They quickly fell in love, and upon graduation they announced their engagement to their respective families, who were thrilled at the beautiful young couple and impressed by Terrence's doting dedication to Kris. They married in Biddeford, Maine on 7 January 1977 in a winter wonderland ceremony, and honeymooned in Jamaica before returning to Seattle.

For a few years the marriage seemed to be happy, as the Harts pursued a slew of wonderful activities, diversions and outings, and Kris bore Kimberly (1979) and David (1985). They moved to Angel Grove, California in 1983 when Terrence received a promotion at his accounting firm and was called to the company headquarters. The move also thrilled her wife, whose sister Corinne had moved to Angel Grove with her husband Steve Leary three years prior. The two families became very close, with Terrence introducing Steve to his father's Franco-German hunting party.

Terrence received another promotion in May of 1987. His salary increased commensurately, and by now it was clear in the company that the 32-year-old manager had enormous dynamism and great executive potential. Encouraged by his bosses to take a more active interest in the company's affairs, Terrence obliged them, excited by the prospect of a career that could propel his family fairy tale to a gorgeous conclusion. This however meant extra time at work and especially on the road, and things only became hotter after the company barely survived the crash of Black Monday 19 October 1987. Terrence missed his daughter Kimberly's First Communion at Easter 1988, earning the wrath of his wife and his mother-in-law. The unconcluded argument was in fact the first argument that the couple had had since meeting each other, and it shook Terrence, so that he was happy when two weeks later to get some distance from everything and travel out of town for work once more.

A storm had set over the Hart household, and an uneasy tension set in and stayed for several years. Conscious that he was spending too much time away from his family, and unhappy with the atmosphere in the house, Terrence took his wife on a second honeymoon after Christmas 1988, and the whole family on several very nice vacations in the few years that followed. The tension was always unresolved once the family returned to Angel Grove, however, and after the same disappointment following a terrific Daytona Beach excursion after Christmas 1990, Terrence found himself despairing of ever finding happiness in the household. In May 1991 Kris confronted Terrence yet again about his frequent absences, this time as he was packing for another business trip. Terrence decided to speak out himself, and showing all the beautiful trappings around the bedroom cried that "all this has to come from somewhere!" Choice words were exchanged and a couple pieces were knocked over and broken, as their David ran into his sister's room and the two held each other, frightened, as they listened to their parents fight.

Several more verbal altercations took place over the next few months; in November, the thirty-seven-year-old Terrence found himself one evening in a bar in New York with a tension, frustration and irritation that the distance of the whole continent could not relieve, even temporarily. He found solstice in a twenty-six-year-old blonde next to him, talking her up and then taking her back to his hotel room.

Although he felt relieved for the night, he knew he had made a horrible mistake and tortured himself the whole way home. At last he resolved to confess to his wife, thinking perhaps she might finally understand what all this had driven him to. Her reaction was cold and candid: "Just go ahead and leave. It's not as though anything will be changing around here." Terrence was irritated by those words but over the next few weeks it became clear Kris was serious. By Christmas they agreed that they would announce a divorce to their children and families right after the school year let out. A new, different sort of tension set in.

While Terrence could admit to himself his part in what had led up to the divorce, he had a difficult time sorting out the fact that there might be something he ought to change in his lifestyle, and continued to work like a horse. His efforts did not pay off, as in late 1994 his firm, whose management had not been able to adapt to the changing economy after the 1987 crisis, announced that it would be liquidating and laying everyone off in six months. Terrence's first thought would be to find a new job of commensurate pay to amply support his kids and pay adequate alimony - he did feel he owed that much to Kris - as well as support a comfortable lifestyle. With his experience and recommendations, he did manage to find a junior executive position in Boston, and moved there in April 1995, leaving his children to finish their education in Angel Grove with their mother, who however would move to Paris with her French fiancé in October of that same year.