THOMASVILLE — About every three years, Trent Reynolds gets the seven-year itch.

Reynolds took the reins of the Thomas County Public Library System in April 2018. In April three years later, he will assume a U.S. Navy librarian position at a U.S. Air Force base on Guam, a 30-mile-long Pacific Ocean island from one to eight miles wide and 8,000 miles from Thomasville.

Living and working on a Pacific island is not new to Reynolds: He was stationed in Hawaii from 1984-95, while in the Navy. He served on different ships ported in Pearl Harbor. Reynolds lived in Hawaii — off and on — for 20 years. As a civilian, he worked as a children’s librarian at a public library in Hawaii.

He worked at libraries at two U.S. Marine Corps bases in North Carolina and later at the Fort Benning library in Georgia.

After library work at Incirlik Air Base on the Mediterranean Sea in Turkey, he returned to the United States and a library job in Waycross.

“Then I ended up over here in Thomasville,” Reynolds said.

On Guam, a U.S. territory, he will be one of a dozen library employees.

While in the Navy, Reynolds transferred every three years.

“I think it’s wired in my brain,” he said. “About every three years, I begin to get wanderlust.”

Father of three grown sons, 57-year-old Reynolds is fascinated by traveling and other cultures.

While in the Navy, Reynolds visited Guam three times while aboard ships. Ships stopped there to take on fuel and for the sailors to get rest and recuperation.

Scuba diving off Guam, Reynolds found a World War II Japanese plane that crashed in the Pacific Ocean.

During his upcoming three-year Guam tour, Reynolds will find it easy to fly to Asian countries and Australia and to travel even more.

Of all the places he has lived, Thomasville stands out.

“This is by far one of the best places I’ve lived and worked,” Reynolds said. 

Senior reporter Patti Dozier can be reached at (229) 226-2400, ext. 1820