Tag Archives: Tuba City(AZ)

The Hana Chronicles: Month 7, Day 9

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

July 30, 2026- As if to underscore her determination, Hana made a point of standing full on her feet, while holding onto her mother, this morning. She practiced standing, with my support, several times this afternoon. I let her stand up, while holding onto the border of the play pen. She is a few inches shy of being able to see over the top, but was able to hold onto it for about 8 seconds. She is leading this. I am providing encouragement and support. I’ve told her that only she knows her limits, and there is no rush. Most kids seem to wait until nine months, before standing with support. Hana will do things on her own timetable.

She napped a fair amount today, largely because she is constantly moving during the day and, depending on the extent to which her top incisors are still bothering her, sometimes tosses and turns a lot at night. She likes to play with company, so I am in the pen a lot. It is usually a cycle of wake up and wash/dress; morning feeding; parents saying goodbye, before going to work; her listening to my prayers (sometimes with her head bowed); us going out for a walk (she in the stroller); medication; story time; nap; lunch; story time; play time; nap, afternoon feeding; play time; welcome back, Mom & Dad; dinner; bath and sleep.

HANA’S NOTE- I want to help out, so I feed myself when Mom is giving me dinner, so she can rest.

YEAR IN REMEMBRANCE-1982 The second set of sea changes came this year. In February, Penny and I got engaged. We were married on the Anniversary of D-Day, June 6. We went on Pilgrimage to the Holy Land, two weeks later-visiting Jerusalem, Bethlehem, the Galilee and the Baha’i holy places in Haifa, Akka and Bahji. It was an overwhelming nine days. We stopped in London, on the way back, and visited the Tomb of Shoghi Effendi, Baha’u;llah’s great-grandson, who guided the Faith for 36 years, after the passing of ‘Abdu’l-Baha. Before summer’s end, we also took a six-day road trip up to a Blackfeet First Nations Reserve, in southern Alberta, joining a Continental Indigenous Council Fire.

Penny and I settled in Tuba City, and she took a job teaching Special Needs students at the Primary school, across the street from the Intermediate School where I worked as a Counselor. We worked out a number of bumps and adjustments that came with sharing a small trailer, after each having lived alone for so many years. A friend in Flagstaff had told me that this would be a stormy marriage, but it would also be a good and strong one. How right he turned out to be.

Worlds Within A World, Part II

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

May 15,2026- From the Saugus world, I got a work ethic, respect for family and tradition, a sense of place. From the Army world, I got self-discipline and awareness that people everywhere are more alike than different. From the College world, I got respect for my female peers and a sense of personal independence. From the Maine world, I got the joy of making it through a few harsh winters, and savouring delightful summers, yet I also came to the realization that not all who work with children have their best interests at heart.

After Maine came the Arizona Central Corridor world (1978-1981)-which brought me first to a private boarding school in Eloy, then to Northern Arizona University, Flagstaff. During this time, I made peace with Mathematics, for many years my bugbear, and for two years at the Villa School, my livelihood. I know that, out of my own struggles, there came an affinity with those in my classes who were having a hard time with the concepts. It made me a credible teacher. I came to see troubled teens as worthy of respect. It made me a better human being. I came to see, and know, the majesty of Arizona, and made the acquaintance of the Pacific coast, as far north as Portland and as far south as Guaymas. I went across country, by bus or by thumb, three times.

The Flagstaff years brought the first real sea change in my life-realizing that my globalist self had counterparts in the Baha’i Faith, which I adopted as my own, early in 1981.I met the woman I would marry, waited out her sorting of her life and tossed aside a major obstacle in mine-saying goodbye to alcoholic beverages. I lost a few friends, but made hundreds more-and found myself oriented towards our country’s First Nations.

The firt Navajo-Hopi world (1981-86) put my newly acquired Masters Degree, in Education (Counseling), to full use. Tuba City, on the western edge of Arizona’s Painted Desert, struck me as close to being a Third World place. There were, at the time, a couple of trading posts and several small cafes. While I was there, a grocery store and small mini mall opened up. The small cafes gave way to well-appointed restaurants. I married Penny, we went on Pilgrimage to Israel and the West Bank, getting a fine guided tour of Jerusalem, the Jordan Valley and the Galilee from a retired IDF officer. We spent nine days total in the Holy Land, six of these in Haifa and Akka, There may never be such a consecrated time as this again in my life, but it gave me a foundation to go forward. We would stop in London, for three days, afterward, and I would have the bounty of speaking before people of whom I was in awe. We also would attend a Council Fire of First Nations, in Alberta, teach the Baha’i Faith in Houston, in Guyana and on the Omaha and Pine Ridge Reservations, as well as keeping the home fires burning on the Navajo and Hopi Nations. We buried a good friend in Tuba City and we buried my father, a year after he and Mom had visited us and toured Arizona.

A phone call, in the early morning hours, in January, 1986, was the inception of Korea world (1986-92) That, and the second Navajo-Hopi world (1992-98) will make up Part III..