Tag Archives: Graduate School

The Road to Diamond, Day 146: Integrity

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Posted by on in Assistance, collaborating, Community, distraction issues, Education, impediments, Matters of Faith, Personal Values, Social, Spiritual, Striving

April 23, 2025- When I was in Graduate School, I was ill during one of the classes that was having a chapter exam. The next class meeting,the professor gave me the exam to do at home. As my textbook was at the ready, I briefly considered making it an open-book test. I couldn’t follow through, as this was a Master’s Program, after all, and “masters” don’t cheat. While the professor initially was suspicious as I submitted the exam, at the next class meeting, my grade reflected my decision to take the exam properly, and the matter was considered moot.

I am presently reading a book entitled “Free Radicals: The Secret Anarchy of Science”, by Michael Brooks. Here, the author details the shenanigans of scientists both famed and obscure. There are numerous examples given, of titans such as Einstein and Newton, and lesser lights, like the hapless Robert Millikan (who claimed credit for discovering the electron’s charge), having fudged data, to make their findings jibe with reality.

In life, there is no hard and fast rule that each and every instance of one’s chosen work is going to go as one pleases. In my years as a counselor, I did a lot of good for many troubled young people, and a few adults. I also failed some people, usually those whose issues were more quotidian, and didn’t fit the “troubled” or “at risk” mode. Both types of people will remember what happened, and will have judged me differently. It makes no sense to inflate one set of work results and sweep the others under the carpet. Integrity requires that I own both. Besides, my work as a teacher and school administrator was more checkered. I have to own that, too.

Integrity, the state of how one acts when no one is looking, has a serious claim to be restored to public service, in fact to be restored to all walks of life. There ought to be confidence in those whose mantra is “The statistics say”, or “Data tells us”. Right now, that confidence is often unmerited.

My Life Thus Far: The Eighties

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Posted by on in Family, Personal Values, Service Activities, Spiritual, Travel

February 20, 2016, Prescott- Today was spent in spiritual study, and an hour or so will be so used, tomorrow afternoon.  All of this was initiated by my beloved, and because of her, the decade of my thirties brought a whole new outlook on life.  The 1980’s were one of the two best decades of this life, up to now.

1980-High Point:  Meeting Penny (December 6)

Low Point:  Scrambling to find housing in Flagstaff (September)

People in the heart:  Penny Fellman, my future wife; my Flagstaff housemates, Mohammed Saeedi, Chris Lugenbuhl and Carol Vireday; the anonymous guys who gave me rides, to/from Oregon; my Mesa friends, the Lunts.

Places in the heart: Flagstaff;  Durango; Zuni; San Diego; Laguna Beach; Redwood National Park; Hebo, OR; Portland; Eugene; Crater Lake; San  Luis Obispo; Santa Barbara.

1981- High Point:  My entry into the Baha’i Faith.

Low Point:  Our temporary break-up.

People in the heart:  Penny; the Cordova family; the Beausoleils; the Travises; Mishabae Mahoney; Hilde Mc Cormick; John Carrillo (my office mate and sounding board); my first nephew and niece, Chris and Marcy.

Places in the heart:  Flagstaff; Tuba City; Dinnebito, AZ; Capitol Reef National Park; Natural Bridges National Monument; San Diego; Julian.

1982- High Points:  Our wedding (June 6); our Baha’i Pilgrimage (June 16- 30).

Low Point: Getting organized into a household.

People in the heart:  My wife; both Moms and Dads; the San Diego Baha’i Community; the Tong family; the staff of the Baha’i World Centre; the Baha’is of London; my mentor at Northland Pioneer College.

Places in the heart:  Tuba City; San Diego; Julian; Dinnebito; Bedminster, NJ; Jerusalem; Haifa; Akko; Bethlehem; London; Canterbury;  Saugus; Bedminster; Standoff, AB; Yellowstone National Park; Bozeman, MT.

1983- High Points:  The Wildfire Conference, at De Pauw University; Baha’i teaching in southern New Mexico and Metro El Paso; my brother, Glenn’s wedding.

Low Point:  My Nana died.

People in the heart:  Penny ( and this goes without saying, until the day she passed); the Baha’is of Tuba City, Dinnebito, Jemez, Phoenix, Las Cruces, El Paso and Chicago; the Biernackes, of El Paso; my second niece, Melanie; my second nephew, Jeff.

Places in the heart:  Tuba City; Dinnebito; Blue Canyon, AZ; Jemez Springs; Durango, CO; Silverton; Ouray; Great Sand Dunes National Park; Chama; Santa Fe; Albuquerque; Chicago; Baha’i House of Worship, Wilmette, IL; Greencastle, IN; Las Cruces; Berino, NM; El Paso; Fabens, TX; Andover, MA.

1984- High Points:  Baha’i teaching in Guyana, Pine Ridge, SD and Macy, NE.

Low Point: The passing of Gordon Tong, our Baha’i friend and mentor.

People in the heart:  Our Guyanese  hosts; the people of Pine Ridge and of the Omaha Nation; our friends and our co-workers on the Navajo Nation; Elizabeth Dahe and her family; our  hosts in Houston and Oklahoma; my third nephew, Nick.

Places in the heart:  Tuba City; Burntwater, AZ; Houston; Ada, OK; Georgetown, Bath, Whim and Meten meer zorg, GY; New York; Macy, NE; Wanblee, Pine Ridge, and Martin, SD; Fort Collins, CO.

1985- High Point:  Both sets of parents visiting.

Low Points:  The deaths of three Navajo boys, in two separate accidents; our separation, while Penny was in Graduate School ( a month is a long time).

People in the heart:  Our parents; Jeff and Helen Kiely; the Baha’is of Dinnebito and Ganado, AZ; my third niece, Kim; my fourth nephew, Matt.

Places in the heart:  Tuba City; Flagstaff; Dinnebito; Polacca, AZ; Red Rock State Park, OK; Effingham, IL; Columbus, OH; Michigan City, IN; Wilmette and Evanston, IL; Grand Canyon; Lake Powell; Prescott; Montezuma’s Castle National Monument; Sedona; Phoenix.

1986- High Point: Our move to Jeju, South Korea, for Penny’s work, as Visiting Professor.

Low Point:  My father’s passing.

People in the heart:  Our parents; my siblings, our extended family; my fifth nephew, Curtis; our friends and co-workers in Arizona and in South Korea.

Places in the heart:  Tuba City; Los Angeles; Seoul, Songtan and Jeju, South Korea; Saugus.

1987- High Point:  My hiring as Visiting Professor, in Jeju.

Low Point:  Having to leave Penny behind for a month, to get a work visa.

People in the heart:  Our Korean colleagues, students and friends; three surviving parents;  our siblings; our friends in Flagstaff.

Places in the heart:  Jeju, Muan, Pusan and Seoul, South Korea; Los Angeles; Portland; Seattle; Butte; Madison, WS; Chicago; Wilmette, IL; Saugus; Bedminster; Greenville and Simpsonville, SC; New Orleans; Phoenix; Honolulu; Tokyo.

1988-High Point: The birth of our son, Aram (July 7).

Low Point:  None, actually.

People in the heart:  Aram (from this point on); the Baha’is of Jeju;  Dr. Kim Chung Hak; our students;  our hosts and friends in Taiwan; Penny’s parents (who flew to Korea for Aram’s birth).

Places in the heart:  Jeju; Pusan; Tsaot’un, Chungli, Taich’ung and T’aipei, Taiwan;

1989- High Point:  Bringing Aram to the United States, to meet our family.

Low Point:  Feeling threatened, while visiting Maine.

People in the heart:  Our extended family; our students; the Baha’is of Jeju and Seoul.

            Places in the heart:  Jeju; Anchorage; New York, Bedminster; Saugus; Lynn, MA; Eliot, ME.

So, while visiting Durango, in November, 1980, I had this inkling that I was ready to meet someone special.  It didn’t happen that weekend, nor on my 30th birthday trip to San Diego.  It was on an Anthropology class trip to Zuni, where Penny and I first connected.  Turns out, she also had had a vision, while meditating on a mesa above her residence in Keams Canyon, AZ, where she was teaching at the time.  The message said that she, too, would meet someone.

Our on again, off again, 18-month friendship became a marriage that lasted, physically, for 29 years.  I believe in the eternity of marriage, and though she’s gone from Earth, we still connect, daily.  We had our ups and downs, especially in the early years, but never went to bed angry with one another.

My entry into the Baha’i Faith helped me cast out the demon of alcohol dependency, and put me on a path to dealing with my larger demon, of self-doubt.  Baha’u’llah has opened up many powerful channels within me- at least I feel them.

Aram’s arrival made me be responsible for someone other than the two of us.  Raising him to adulthood was the only big task that God has ever given me.  While I wasn’t the greatest father to have been given the bounty, I gave it a good, solid effort and he is an amazing young man.

We traveled a lot, the two of us, then the three of us, mostly in service to our Faith and to visit family. The Eighties were a decade of primarily air travel, though crowding into a Peugeot, and then a lorry (truck), in Guyana, was quite an adventure.  Our Toyota Tercel got quite a workout, those four years we lived in Tuba City.  It became a young lady’s first car, when we moved to Korea.

Pilgrimage to the Baha’i Holy Sites, in Haifa and Akko, Israel was the seminal defining point of the decade.  Our marriage, and the birth of our son, six years later, were entirely safeguarded by our having begun life together, in this manner.

The Nineties would be a second amazing decade.

 

 

The Road to 65, Mile 17: The Office Party

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Posted by on in Personal goals, Social

December 15, 2014, Prescott-  Yesterday evening, I attended a Red Cross office Christmas Party, at the lovely home of one of the lead volunteers.  It was about seven miles out in the country, and the home was both modern and cozy.  I haven’t attended very many office gatherings, over the years, but I have embarrassed myself only once, back in the drinking-problem days, when I was first in Graduate School.  Since then, it’s been a nice learning curve of honour and respect.

We had a nice assortment of foods, and I brought my bubbly cranberry (non-alcoholic).  The two dogs present kept us on our toes, vis-a-vis placement of food.  Several photos were taken, and I was not in any of them- being just happy to converse with several people, on a variety of topics.  The party game was “Janga”, of which I opted out, being of not the greatest fine-motor coordination.  I am applying for a position within our office, so hopefully  my not playing won’t prove to be this year’s equivalent of “You didn’t drink the boss’s brand of beer.”

This brings me to the position.  I have looked over the specs for this job, and I have a vision for it, which I will lay out, first on the application, and later, with my wider audience.  One of my siblings once upbraided me for rarely delivering on my promises, in the work world.  He was largely correct, but I did, in the 1990’s, implement and administer a Comprehensive, Competency-based Guidance program.  Sure, it was part of a national trend, yet the teachers and I made it work, tailored to our school’s local conditions. I can do that again. Being much better at playing well with others than I used to be, is a big deal.

The new position would revamp my plans for the next six years or so.  I would free-lance travel a lot less, but the stability would make my eventual journeys a whole lot more comfortable, when they happen.  I would definitely be out and about, a lot, though, in my territory of northwestern Arizona.  A good life involves a series of adjustments, and many of those are self-determined.