Braggin Rights

Writing is usually done to an audience. I tell those who work for me that they should pick one person, typical of their target audience, and write to that person.

I often pick my mother if I'm trying to explain things; or my wife, Dolores, or maybe a specific reporter who I'm trying to reach with a message.

Here, however, in order to find a voice I need to find someone to talk to. It's gonna take a while.

So in the meantime, I'll just brag a bit about our kids.

Tom, now a firefighter in Seattle, is our oldest. Four years in the Marines; graduated with History degree from Seattle University (the Jesuits), showed a deft hand at carpentry; and then led his class at the Seattle Fire Academy. After a dozen tough years of hard work, thoroughly aided and abetted by Joy, his wife, things are looking better: good income, great kids, a nice house, and they both have "regular" jobs and can begin to settle down. The two of them have made us so proud.

Michael, a success at everything he puts his hand to, was our first college grad. Townson University in Baltimore. He not only got his degree he did it while working full time. Now creating the insides of Boeing jets, also in Seattle, he's thinking about moving back east. He's going about it like a total pro and it's exciting to watch him do everything right. My only regret for Mike is the string of broken hearts he's left behind. Every company he's ever worked for wants him back. The guys in Baltimore will give him a place to live and a car; the specialty display house in a northern Seattle suburb let him take 5 months off (traveling to South America to teach surfing and walk the cougar [think large lion without a mane] and took him back thanking him for returning; and as people are being laid off where he's now working, they're giving him more work to do. His grandfather would be proud of him.

Margaret has the itchy feet. After college it was a year in Seattle. After Seattle it was two years in the Peace Corps in Kazakhstan teaching English and learning Russian. Then Brooklyn for near a year teaching elementary school children about the environment and next northern Vermont working on an organic farm and perhaps doing some writing of her experiences in Kaz.

Dolores, of course, helps people. Really HELPS them. She's a nurse at Stony Brook University Hospital. Not a take-a-temp, run-an-IV, or give meds kinda nurse, but a nurse who helps get people out of the hospital; helps them stay alive at home, or go there to die; helps them have a quality of life they might not expect to have; helps the family care; and most of all, she cares for the family.....an average of a dozen hours a day, it seems.

A great family? YOU BET. I get pains in my chest pounding it in pride. What wonderful children, what a wonderful partner, what a wonderful adventure. Wonder what's next (besides a nine hour car ride next weekend taking Margaret to Vermont.)