The Hana Chronicles: Month 7, Day 30

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Posted by on in children, collaborating, Community, Education, Family, impediments, Inner Struggles, Inspiration, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

August 20, 2026- Hana spoke clearly-“Papa, you can do this.”, as I struggled with the safety straps on her newly-installed car seat, this morning. In the end, I needed some reminders from Aram, over the phone, but she was right, I did a thing-I got her safely strapped in and off we went to my chiropractor’s office for my semi-monthly adjustment. Hana was along for the ride, and was quiet, while I was adjusted and afterward, while I paid the tab. I got her safely strapped in for the ride home and the rest of the day was quiet.

My granddaughter is going through a growth spurt, both physically and mentally. She is nearly 30″ tall and almost 19 pounds. Her vocalizations are ever more understandable. She can project her voice quite well-and not just when she is upset. She also likes to get into mischief, and so has had some clear boundaries drawn, which she is slowly accepting without a whole lot of fuss. “No playing with food, or eating utensils” is my mantra at lunch and dinner.

HANA’S NOTE- I thought it was funny to open my mouth and let food fall out. Papa didn’t think so, and it was put right back on my spoon and back into my mouth. Oh, well, at least he plays around with me in the playpen.

YEAR IN REMEMBRANCE-2003 I had a steady job for the 2002-03 Academic Year-as an elementary school counselor for a small group of Special Needs students. It was only for a year, but it gave me a chance to do what I do best, professionally.

That was about the only thing that approached normality in this most jarring of years. In late April, Penny felt faint, while waiting for a Memorial Service to start, in a treeless cemetery, in east Phoenix. She fell backwards and her head hit a cinder block. She said she felt fine afterwards, but we got her checked at an ER for good measure. Not much out of the ordinary showed on the brain scan.

Two weeks later, as she was prepping for an unrelated procedure, she again lost her balance and fell into a bathtub, hitting her head against the wall tiles. This triggered a long-dormant neurological disease. Gradually, she went from walking more slowly on her own, to needing a cane, By October, she needed to use a walker.

We moved out of Sierra Pines, in early September, having purchased a nice, cozy one-story house, in a fairly quiet neighbourhood, in midtown Phoenix, on the near west side. Moving was accomplished over Labor Day weekend. By then, I had secured a job as a mathematics teacher, at a middle school, three blocks north of the house. I could walk to work. Penny still worked at El Mirage, but had moved into a Special Education position. Aram was a sophomore at Cortez, despite having moved out of its attendance area.

My choice of jobs was another bad move. Though I got along with most of the students, and both of my female co-teachers, relations with the Team Lead and with the administrators were not good. Their thinly-veiled disdain for my disabled wife made things that much worse.

One bright spot, though, was a 75th birthday celebration for my mother, who had never had a celebration in her honour, alone, in all my years, anyway.. Most of her surviving siblings were there, along with a few of my Dad’s siblings and the oldest of her grandchildren. We spent the next day in Boston, taking in some of her favourite sites, riding around on a “jump on and off” bus. We ended the weekend with a large gathering in her backyard, with all the grandchildren present. Family can be healing.

The Hana Chronicles: Month 7, Day 29

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Posted by on in Assistance, children, collaborating, Community, Education, Family, impediments, Inspiration, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

August 19, 2026-Hana finally had enough of a dry chicken tender and tipped her plate over, onto the high chair tray. I put everything back onto the plate, and after she had composed herself again (after about ten minutes), heated the meat in a slight water base. She finished all the vegetables and grains-and ate about half of the chicken, then pushed the plate away- There was nothing rude about the last action; she was just not a fan of what was probably a tasteless item. I think this girl will be happy when her pediatrician gives the go-ahead for adding herbs and spices to her diet. She is, generally speaking, a plate cleaner, not a plate dumper.

My granddaughter is on a larger mission. She can already stand, for ten minutes, with just one hand holding onto a bar of the playpen. She can take 4-5 steps, if someone is supporting her. Her speech has the appropriate cadence, intonation reflective of her mood and even a questioning inflection, when she wants to know something. I can usually interpret what she is saying, based on context.

There was good news, when her mother got home this evening. Yunhee will have next week off. Hana will turn eight months old on Saturday, and have her mother’s company for the week. She seemed to get a bit of what her mother was saying-and smiled at the three of us, one at a time.

HANA’S NOTE- Papa can be stubborn, and I guess I can be, also. He is not mean, though, and when I lose my temper, he just keeps calm. I need that.

YEAR IN REMEMBRANCE-2002 This seemed to be a year for the abductions of girls, on a more open scale than in the past. There was the case of Elizabeth Smart, taken from her home, in June. She would be held captive until March, 2003. There was Erica Pratt, kidnapped near her home in Philadelphia, held in a house and able to escape, the next day, by chewing through the duct tape that bound her wrists and smashing a window. Some nearby children helped her get out of the house and alerted police. Other girls were not as fortunate; and some were killed, While the number of victimized girls was probably not any larger than the all too great number of such cases, every year, the media finally was getting sensitive to the phenomenon, in part because of the work of John Walsh and the National Center for Missing and Exploited Children.

The nation was also still dealing with the aftermath of September 11, and November 12, 2001-as well as the “Shoe Bomber”, who attempted to set of an explosive in his shoe, while on a Transatlantic flight, in December of the the previous year. A botched attempt to fly a plane into a bank headquarters, in Tampa and attacks on a Jewish pre-sschool in Los Angeles, in March, served only to keep fears raw. Then, in October, came the mass murders in Bali, 202 people being killed. We saw the Transportation safety Agency established=primarily at airports, but also at ferry terminals and at railway stations.

Through all this, Penny, Aram and I kept steady. I contented myself with substitute teaching, in two Phoenix school districts, and was able to offer continuity. Penny kept on as a second grade teacher, at El Mirage Elementary. Aram finished middle school and began his freshman year at Cortez High school, near our apartment. We had to deal with incompetent managers, after the man who had negotiated our lease left. Mold issues persisted, until I obtained the business phone number of the investment banker who owned the complex and called him to explain our situation. He sent his own crew out, from San Diego, and both our apartment and the next door neighbour’s unit were successfully relieved of mold. That sort of cooperation doesn’t happen very often, according to the attorney who helped us out on another issue. (Charges being added on, in mid-year.)

It was a fairly normal year for us, ahead of some doozies.

The Hana Chronicles: Month 7, Day 28

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Posted by on in Assistance, children, collaborating, Community, Family, Historical, impediments, Inner Struggles, Personal Values, Social, Striving

August 18, 2026- Hana does not like it when her meal gets cold, especially the meat. She began fussing, but stopped when she saw that I was not reacting, and was just sitting and waiting for her to stop. I then reheated her chicken, and she finished it. She leaned over and put her head against my chest, when the meal was over and I had cleaned her up. It was her way of asking if I loved her, in spite of her little tantrum.

I love her the way I love her father, and the way I loved her grandmother- unconditionally. I don’t get sidetracked by her being disagreeable, nor do I reward her for it. She is seeing that there are rules that need to be followed, even when it is not what she might want in the moment. She is approaching toddlerhood, already. She has some agency and dignity, which is respected. Likewise, she is being taught to respect the agency and dignity of her parents-and of her grandfather.

HANA’S NOTE- I hate it when my food gets cold. But, I like to play at the table. Papa makes me behave.

YEAR IN REMEMBRANCE-2001

In my years of handling disturbances, crises and other difficulties, I have had no trouble rising to the occasion and seeing things through to a resolution. I was not prepared, though, for a well-organized, slow-rolling absconding by two students, two days before Valentine’s Day. Multiple people were involved in this, and I, focused heavily on the day-to-day grind of running a residential school, was the last to know. Students told me, later, in shame, that there were one or two staff members, at least one parent and several of the residents who helped the girls, The kids didn’t think I’d be held responsible, when they did their part in the caper. I held myself responsible, though, and resigned that same night. The girls were located, the next day, and faced the law.

I fell back on Substitute Teaching, and Penny, having finished her semester in Mesa. did the same. We made the best of it, and truth be known, I was physically and mentally exhausted by my work at the Academy. I was actually glad to be done with it, and I was definitely done with school administration.

In August, Penny got a full-time job at El Mirage Elementary School, west of Phoenix. We moved to an apartment complex in midtown Phoenix, near what was then Metrocenter. Sierra Pines was, at first, reasonably well-run, and we felt fairly safe. I signed on to Substitute in two nearby school districts, while applying for various School Counselor positions.

On the morning of September 11, I went to a grocery store to buy a few items for the week. When I turned on my car radio, afterward, Morning Monkey broke into his playlist to announce that an airplane had just crashed into the World Trade Center, in New York. It hit me that this was a terrorist act. When I got home, Penny noticed that my face was ashen. She went to work and Aram went to his middle school. I stayed at home and was glued to the TV screen, going out only for a sandwich at lunchtime, just to reconnect with the outside world for an hour. My wife and son both came home early.

I would work at substitute teaching, the rest of the year, I went to the business of a Sikh man who was slain, in the aftermath of the terror attacks, and paid my respects to his family. Penny and I ate at Arab-owned restaurants, to show that we did not hold the average person responsible for the acts of extremists. On the long weekend of Veteran’s Day, we were visiting Penny’s parents, in Prescott. On November 12, we woke early and had the TV on. News came of another plane crashing into an apartment complex near the Queens-Midtown Tunnel, also in New York.The complex was home to many New York City police officers and firefighters. The official version was that this was pilot error. I sense differently, in my bones, to this day.

In any event, not much has been the same, since September 11, 2001.

The Hana Chronicles: Month 7, Day 27

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Posted by on in Assistance, children, collaborating, Community, Education, Family, impediments, Inner Struggles, Personal goals, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

August 17, 2026-Our girl is getting ever more intense about being able to stand, and about learning to walk. She can stand with support, for nearly five minutes and was taking steps, while her father was holding her up, this evening.

Hana is also practicing hand-eye coordination. Given some skinless grapes that had been cut into small pieces, she meticulously picked up even the smallest piece and put it in her mouth. She stayed focused on a particularly slippery morsel, getting it to her mouth after five tries.

HANA’S NOTE- I am going to be a helper, not a taker. So, I want to keep working hard.

YEAR IN REMEMBRANCE-2000 Our world did anything but end. We rang in the New, at the home of a Baha’i friend, watching a variety of social viewpoints on TV, and having called Penny’s parents to wish them Happy Anniversary, as they did not feel up to traveling “in a time of uncertainty”, felt like this New Year’s Eve was unlike any other. There was, however, no finality about any of it.

We finished up our year at Salome, and moved on, once my Assistant Principal got the nod to run the school for the 2000-01 Academic Year. We spent the summer at the Fellmans’ house, in a rustic development called Kingswood Estates. It had a Homeowners Association, so we had to follow certain rules. Our long-haired dachshund, Lady, was very much with us. There were roving bands of javelinas in the community, as well as mountain lions, so we were careful not to let her out alone. On one early morning, before sunrise, I was walking Lady and we came upon a small family of javelinas. I picked her up and held her, while she instinctively kept quiet. The herd went about their business and left us alone.

Penny took a couple of classes at Mesa Community College, and so had an apartment in Mesa, which Aram and I stayed in, while I also tried to get a job in the Phoenix area. A week or so into the Academic Year, I was offered a Principalship at Mingus Mountain Academy, a facility for adjudicated girls. I took the job, knowing that we had the house in Kingswood for the year. I got off to a fairly good start, despite the lingering presence of my immediate predecessor, who was basically waiting for me to mess up, so that he could come back and “fix things” and the noisome Assistant Principal, who interfered with my work, more than helped. Still, I earned the trust of the girls and had a generally good relationship with the teachers and with the facility’s Executive Director.

It was, though, a 7:30 a.m.-6 p.m. job, with no holidays (as the residents did not get to go home for breaks). There was a weekend crew, as school was Monday-Friday, so that was a relief. I worked Thanksgiving and Christmas, even working extra hours on my 50th birthday, as a resident had run off and we all needed to track her down. It took a few hours, but we found her. The girls were mainly from the city, and did not take into consideration that there were bears and mountain lions in the area,

It was a true labour of love, but I was a tad too trusting of some residents. The year to come would bear that out, with hard consequences.

The Hana Chronicles: Month 7, Day 26

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Posted by on in Assistance, collaborating, Community, Education, Family, impediments, Inner Struggles, Inspiration, Personal goals, Personal Values, service, Social, Striving

August 16, 2026- Both Aram and I have told Hana the story of the boy who cried wolf. She has adopted the practice of crying every time her parents tell her “No” or make her wait for something. When I told her the story, this evening, she listened with rapt attention-and decided that crying about every little thing is not such a useful idea. Mental processing precedes the ability to speak.

We made a family outing to Carrollton, this afternoon, enjoying Korean noodles and a couple of dessert items: Three of us shared a piece of ice cream cake, then shared a Korean “Snowflake” bowl, which has fruit, ice cream and shaved ice. We mixed the three together, to make a fun treat. Hana watched all this, with a good nature, though her face said “Where’s mine?”

In the early evening, I went to a fund-raising bazaar, at the Plano Baha’i Center, and picked up about a dozen books for Hana, Some of them are mini-books that she can easily look at, for several minutes at a time. She was delighted, when I showed her the books.

HANA’S NOTE- When my Daddy tells me to stop doing something, using his Daddy voice, I have to listen. When Papa tells me about somebody being naughty, I listen to him also.

YEAR IN REMEMBRANCE-1999 The bottom fell out in Chilchinbeto, in April. I turned down a request by a Governing Board member for reimbursement, on an item that would have been double dipping. Between that, and the ongoing suspicion regarding the deceased Paraprofessional, I was terminated, effective June 30. I told the Board that perhaps a Dineh would be more to their liking. They did hire a qualified Navajo educator. (As it happened, they fired him, too, after a year.) I was able to upgrade the professional development of the teaching staff, send the eighth grade class to Hawai’i and to an Arizona Diamondbacks baseball game and hire a competent financial services team. We would have continued on an upward arc, but for the insecurity of five people.

I continued to take Penny to see a neurologist, in Flagstaff, during the Spring and Summer. Eventually, we also began seeing an acupuncturist,and another neurologist, in Phoenix. Between all those services, her brain health stabilized. Aram went on a Tae Kwon Do tournament in South Korea,, and was able to visit his birthplace, Jeju, again. While he was away, we left Jeddito, and the Navajo Nation.

I secured a one-year appointment as Principal of Salome High School, in the desert west of Phoenix. I worked under a former professor of mine, who served as Superintendent. We got along, for the most part. My assistant principal was also in training to become the principal, the following year. At times, I felt like I was sandwich filling. At least, the Superintendent was mostly supportive of my efforts, save when I trod on his turf.

Penny worked as the lone Special Education Teacher, as we had but eighty students in the high school. She bonded well with them. Aram had a rough first semester, in the Sixth Grade of the Elementary School. He gradually, with professional help, managed to recover his equilibrium.

My outreach included a visit to each of the feeder schools, once each semester, as well as evening town meetings with parents in each of the communities sending students to the high school. These visits were well received. I got along well with the teachers and with the majority of the students. Keeping peace between the Hispanic and Anglo students required active mediation and conflict resolution sessions. I also brought in a program called “Responsible Thinking’, which Penny had studied in one of her classes at NAU. It was seen by some in the community as mumbo jumbo, and didn’t really get much traction.

We approached Y2K with a sense that there would not be as drastic a change as some were expecting.

The Hana Chronicles, Month 7, Day 25

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Posted by on in children, collaborating, Community, Education, Family, Historical, impediments, Inspiration, Personal goals, Personal Values, Social, Striving

August 15, 2026- Hana marches to her own drummer. Her father, for reasons of his own, is rather prescriptive. He is learning, though, to let her do her own thing. I feel that she knows what she is doing, in the macro sense. Her mission is to master standing up and then set to learning to walk. Hana’s mother also has her notions of what is needed by her child, but she is less authoritative and is more concerned with Hana’s health and hygiene, than with how Hana spends her time.

Along those lines, Hana had her first breakfast this morning-a small bowl of oatmeal, followed by apple in yogurt. We explained to her that breakfast is most often a lighter meal than are lunch or dinner. She was fairly content with what was served. It was enough, that she was in her high chair for breakfast, rather than down in a bouncy seat, looking up at us.

Much of my afternoon was spent going through a box or two-lots of bungee cords; Aram’s second grade drawings and his “Story of Me”, from third grade; Penny’s graduation cap, from her third and final Master’s Graduation-the only one she ever attended, because I was there and wanted to make a big deal of it; her Tae Kwon Do certificate, which I want to show to Hana, when she is old enough to know waht the martial art is. Hana’s afternoon was divided between pushing herself to stand and crawl with her torso lifted, and napping.

HANA’S NOTE- I am going to do things my own way, as much as I can.

YEAR IN REMEMBRANCE-1998 Although I still enjoyed being a counselor, I had invested a fair amount of time and energy into getting my Administrative Certificate. I had covered for the Principal and Assistant Principal at Jeddito, often enough, that even with contrived situations that one of my rivals had set up to try and embarrass me, my management of the school had basically gone well. Penny believed in me, and so, when I was told of an opening in a Community School, at Chilchinbeto, I put in my application. I was hired by the Athletic Director, who, oddly enough, became my Assistant Principal.

I left Jeddito in August, though Penny stayed there for another year. We were therefore a weekend couple, something that oour coworkers in Jeddito understood, but which raised the hackles of several people in Chilchinbeto. I was Principal, in a school of 200 students, with an Executive Director above me, in the same office. There was a core of influential people in the small community,who wanted to see a Dineh person in the Principalship. They tolerated me, with the quiet belief that I would be gone in a year. On Halloween, I had taken Aram, who lived with me and was in Fifth Grade, to Jeddito. When we came back, i was told that one of the Paraprofessionals, a leader of the skeptics, had died in a one car accident. There were those who believed I had something to do with her death, even though I was 150 miles away at the time. God knows, I would never have brought harm to anyone, regardless of political differences. Still, this was a superstitious community at that time, and there was an undercurrent of suspicion, for the rest of the academic year. The teachers and I were united, though, and we carried on our best, on behalf of the students.

Penny’s year at Jeddito, under an unstable administration, was not much better. We were in contact by phone, and I spent weekends with her, so our marriage didn’t suffer.At the end of the year, however, while we were in Prescott, visiting her parents, she tripped and fell over their large family dog, hitting her head against a door.

The last year of the Twentieth Century would see us facing a serious health matter.


The Hana Chronicles: Month 7, Day 24

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Posted by on in Assistance, children, collaborating, Community, Education, Family, impediments, Inspiration, Matters of Faith, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving, Travel

August 14, 2026- Hana and I took her Daddy to retrieve his car, this afternoon. While the initial plan was for him to merely pick up the vehicle, there was an extended wait for his service adviser to come back from lunch, so Hana and I went into the waiting area of the Service Department, which was large, cool and very spare. I entertained Hana with a water bottle, which she held and felt its coolness and its rough exterior.

Just when she was getting frustrated at not being allowed to drink out of it, her Dad and the service adviser appeared. Plans had changed. He was getting some further work done on the car, and we went back to the house. Hana was a bit tired, so she napped in the car seat, which is still rear-facing.

She babbled a lot, in an animated cadence, throughout the day. When I changed her diaper, this evening, she started mimicking what she heard as my voice, saying, in a raspy voice: “Wow, that’s a lot.” Her bubbly personality is emerging, more and more, as the days progress. It is truly a joy to be here, doing this work.

HANA’S NOTE- I want to be able to drink from a bottle!

YEAR IN REMEMBRANCE-1997- I failed at a few things, this year. My lingering shyness, lack of athletic ability and self-doubt led me to fall down, in meeting the needs of a group of troubled adolescent boys, who started out just wanting to have my support and friendship. I had no problems, as a counselor, working with younger children and with adolescent girls. Middle school boys were, for some reason, a different matter- especially when their hook was basketball.

The other rough spot, for me, was resolving petty disputes between adolescents. I thought this was something that they should be able to figure out among themselves. A parent disagreed, and complained that I was not meeting her son’s needs. I thought back to how I was raised, and had my answer: My own mother would not intervene in any disputes that we had with neighbour kids..

We went back East, as usual, and visited Dave, Debbie and their kids, in eastern Pennsylvania. It was our first time meeting their daughter, Rebecca, who was holding her own with her two big brothers. We made a couple of other stops along the way. At one point, we stopped at a National Cemetery, in Illinois, to pay respects to a former sergeant of mine, who had been later killed in action. We also took in a couple of sites in the Abraham Lincoln National Historical Park.

This, though, was the last year of relative normalcy in our lives, for quite some time.

The Hana Chronicles: Month 7, Day 23

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Posted by on in Assistance, children, collaborating, Community, Education, Family, impediments, Inspiration, Matters of Faith, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving, Travel

August 13, 2026- Hana got a boost, this afternoon, from one of her physicians; Her functioning, in a key area, is showing stability. This particular area of health is measured every three months, until age 3. She is showing in the higher percentile, and is developing skills at a consistently high clip.

Hana listened very intently, at what the doctor was saying, perhaps storing information for later. She seems to know that certain things are more important than others. She has been very good about taking mid-morning medication, for example. She is also fastidious about beginning her mornings with exercise, even if she is on the changing table-which leads us to insist that she wait until the diaper is changed!

HANA’S NOTE- We drove a long way, in Papa’s car, to see a new doctor. The people at that hospital are very nice.

YEAR IN REMEMBRANCE-1996 Cracks started showing in our Jeddito life. Our next door neighbour died, during Spring Break, so we cut our southern Arizona jaunt short. The principal was fired, in mid-year and a School Psychologist took the reins, temporarily. Penny and a co-teacher had a program called Collaborative Literacy Intervention Plan (CLIP), which got results and kudos from the Governing Board.

My program went well, though there was some difficulty with the Superintendent, looking to find fault with our summer program, for no other reason than to have cause to eliminate it. The Board protected us, and despite some setbacks, such as a bus conking out, halfway up a hill on the way to Phoenix, we managed to get to several interesting places.

We went back East, as a family, for three weeks in July. A week was spent in Massachusetts and one week was spent in New Jersey. The rest was spent going to and from the Coast. We made the second of our visits to Bosch Baha’i School, in Santa Cruz, California, by taking a road trip. (The first was in 1994, by air.) Bosch is atop a high cliff, with breathtaking views of the ocean. We were there for a Spiritual Literacy conference. Afterwards, we drove down the Coast, getting our first views of Monterey, San Luis Obispo and Santa Barbara-the last being towards sundown.

I would be seriously evaluating my continued effectiveness as a counselor, in the year to come.

The Hana Chronicles: Month 7, Day 22

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Posted by on in Assistance, children, collaborating, Community, Education, Family, impediments, Inspiration, Personal Values, Social, Striving

August 12, 2026- Hana played Hide and Seek with me, this afternoon. She hid behind a curtain, and I pretended to not know where she was. She thought it was great fun, and laughed for a minute or two, before coming out from behind the curtain. This evening, when her mother sang “Itsy Bitsy Spider” in an atonal manner, Hana groaned. She knows how the song is supposed to go. She does like her Mom’s singing Korean songs, and would probably groan if I tried singing those.

She took four steps this afternoon, with my support. Walking has thus become an intermediate goal, and will probably immediately follow standing, once she can do the latter for five or ten minutes, with support. She can stand for about 30 seconds without support, which is pretty good for a seven-month-old.

HANA’S NOTE- I like Hide and Seek. When I start walking, I will hide in places Papa can’t find me. I will probably give myself away, though, by giggling.

YEAR IN REMEMBRANCE-1995 This was a year that I put up a swing set, for Aram and his friends to use. The neighbour kids were also welcome to use it. One boy fell off and bruised himself. Knowing his mother, and her desire to handle her children’s problems herself, I sent him home, once it was clear that he wasn’t badly hurt. In the night, though, he and two other mischief makers came and wrecked the swing set. His mother re-reimbursed me for the damage, but we had to take the equipment down and haul it to the dump.

Aram had friends in the Hopi villages, who were coaxed into meanness towards him, by older men. One of those men ended up dying in a roll-over, a few weeks later. There was prejudice, and there was a lack of self-control. The kind people on both Reservations helped us cope and we continued to be invited to social dances.

We went, as a family, to a Baha’i school in the Midwest, during the summer. Aram was sleepwalking, a couple of nights, and we were taken to task for this, by the Administrators. We were able to keep better watch on him, after the third night, so nothing bad happened during the rest of the camp. On the day we left, however, he went by himself to the playground, climbed up on a piece of equipment, and suffered a mishap, which resulted in us taking him to the ER. We assured the administrators of the school that we did not hold them responsible for what he did without permission. The rest of the journey was error-free.

We lost Penny’s paternal grandfather, the inventor and businessman, Abraham C. “Al” Fellman, in late summer. “Grandpa Al” was 95. He had invented the Fellman Boot, the first combat boot with a non-slip tread. It was adopted for use by the U.S. Navy, in World War II. To think that two of my uncles wore this boot, on their respective destroyers, during the Battle of the Coral Sea, and the Battle of Midway, is quite a revelation. Al was a gracious and graceful, gentleman.

Life continued to be mostly a positive experience.

The Hana Chronicles: Month 7, Day 21

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Posted by on in children, collaborating, Community, Education, Entertainment, Family, Hiking and Nature, impediments, Inspiration, Matters of Faith, Personal Values, Spiritual, Striving, Travel

August 11, 2026- Hana is fully into practicing standing up, and is very clear about wanting me nearby, so she can hold onto me while boosting herself up. I am close by, anyway, to make sure she doesn’t have any hard falls. The play pen is high enough that there is no danger of her climbing over.

The bedtime struggles have started; essentially, she can be put in the crib at the same time, but it takes her longer to lie down and go to sleep. She has one teething ring and one plush toy in the crib, s she will fall asleep more from boredom than anything else-and I recommend to her parents that they go with that. Our girl is very active during the day. and needs her naps, so it will take her a bit more time at night, to wind down.

She is very good about telling me when she needs a diaper change and in reminding me that it’s her supper time, if her parents are running a little late in getting home from work. She likes most foods, but winces at the taste of stewed Roma tomatoes. Her favourites are the naturally sweet things, like carrots, apples and squash. She also likes salmon and chicken.

HANA’S NOTE- Papa had ice cream for dessert at lunch. I wish I could have ice cream!

YEAR IN REMEMBRANCE-1994 I lost my youngest brother, Brian, in March. It will forever cast a shadow over St. Patrick’s Day, but he left us after blessing the family for nearly 29 years. He taught us love, forbearance, patience and the knowledge that there is value in every human life. All the lessons I absorbed, from watching my parents raise and safeguard him would become very valuable, in nine very short years.

Our summer started with Bellemont Baha’i Summer school, at the salubrious camp, fifteen miles west of Flagstaff. In the 1990s, we still had our meals prepared by a “chuckwagon crew”, three or four men who cooked everything over an outdoor cook stove. The program was well planned, with deepenings on both Baha’i history and the path to a more virtues-based society. Recreation was always vigorous. We provided both volleyball and badminton nets. Another staple was a youth trip to some Lava Tubes, northeast of Bellemont. Penny and I joined a group that climbed Kendrick Peak, an outlier of the San Francisco Peaks.

We made a trip eastward, including Aram’s first visit to the Baha’i House of Worship, in Wilmette, IL While we were praying silently, he snuck away and began to speak into the microphone. This earned him a sharp rebuke from the security guard. He later told me, “Daddy, I didn’t know Baha’is could be mean.” I told him there was difference between “mean” and strict, and that from now on, he needed to be quiet in the House of Worship.

Penny returned to work, in August, taking a second grade classroom. She lost no skills in her time away from teaching and her students were making great strides in the first semester, My counseling efforts benefited from the addition of a four-pronged program that the new Principal brought with her. She had been a counselor for several years, and I valued her recommendations, though her manner could be quite abrupt. The four prongs, Academic, Vocational, Social and Leisure. were able to be worked into my work with each class. I also was fully into the Red Ribbon program, which addressed substance abuse issues.

The Winter holidays meant a three-day Baha’i Winter school, at a hotel in Phoenix. A large group attended this, each year, with many dressed in their finest clothes. We were business casual, and enjoyed the gathering, nonetheless. Aram had a fairly good experience in the children’s classes, which focused on virtues. It was always pleasant in Phoenix, in December. New Year’s Eve always meant Penny’s parents’ anniversary, so we joined them in Prescott.

The decade had established a sweet routine.