The People We Meet In Heaven

Summer is a great time to catch up with friends, but it can also be impossible with my tendency to pack something into every minute. Recently a friend and I were trying to catch up before school started, but I had this and she had that. I had a bike ride. She had a book club.  I wish I wanted to join a book club. It sounds so intellectual. Challenging. Prestigious. But I don’t. I love stimulating discussions surrounding books though.

Years ago when my former partner was in a book club, she’d grumble that they rarely talked about the book. Instead they would talk about their husbands, kids, and daily lives while sipping wine and snacking on exotic-for-Idaho cheeses.  She enjoyed the camaraderie but really wanted to discuss characters and themes. Often she’d tell me about the books and we would discuss. One of my favorite books that I’ve never read is “The Five People You Meet in Heaven.”

From Wikipedia, “The Five People You Meet in Heaven is the story of Eddie, a wounded war veteran who lives what he believes is an uninspired and lonely life fixing rides at a seaside amusement park. On his 83rd birthday, Eddie is killed while trying to save a little girl from a falling ride. He awakes in the afterlife, where he learns that heaven is not a location but a place in which your life is explained to you by five people who were in, who affected, or were affected by, your life.”

The premise in the book is that they aren’t family members or people in Eddie’s everyday life but rather people he encountered for a short term. I love exploring this idea.  Who might my five people be?

The first person I think of is a former scholarship administrator at Idaho State.  I was a fortunate rarity awarded enough scholarships to cover tuition, room and board. My mom didn’t like her dorm experience at the University of Wisconsin, however, and her accounts of cold showers, girl drama, and raucous parties led me to turn down the room and board scholarship and live at home. That was one of the worst decisions of my life.

I went from star athlete and big fish on the high school campus to knowing no one and not involved in anything. I was removed from student life and with mostly older males in my chemistry, physics, calculus and engineering classes, I struggled to find a peer group. Near the end of that semester, my mom found out I was gay, and my world turned further upside down.  Her first words included “disgusted, humiliated and embarrassed” and my home became an emotional minefield. I needed refuge.

I was working at a department store, but couldn’t afford to move out. My course load required copious time to study and I yearned for the traditional social circles of a college student. My birthday and the holidays were on the horizon and I wanted to be where I wasn’t surrounded by this unfamiliar shroud of disappointment.

Since Mom saved every report card, award certificate and scholarship letter and hadn’t thrown them away in a fit of rage (yet), I knew exactly where to look. I dug up the room and board letter and called the lady whose name was at the bottom. I stuttered through introducing myself, explained that I had turned down the scholarship, and that I regretted not getting the on-campus experience. I point blank asked if she would consider reinstating the award. I don’t remember how the conversation went—if she said yes right away or if she had to get back to me—but she reinstated my scholarship and I moved into the dorms the second semester of my freshman year.

That scholarship required a 3.5 GPA, and with my first semester turmoil, I only got a 3.2. I was placed on probation immediately and needed straight A’s my second semester.  Mid-way through after getting a history test back with a “C”, I knew I wasn’t going to make it. I left class crying and went right to the scholarship angel’s office to thank her for giving me the opportunity. Without my asking, she offered another round of probation if I took a summer class. I enrolled, got an “A” and my GPA never dipped below a 3.5 after that.

The direction of my life changed dramatically because of this woman’s compassion. I met lifelong friends in the dorms. I walked on the volleyball team. I graduated with no student loan debt as the College of Engineering’s Outstanding Student—all because of her simple kindness. I imagine that the people we meet in heaven are the people we meet on earth who were simply kind. I hope so.

PHS: Living the Legacy

Published in the Idaho State Journal on August 30, 2015.

I just had one of the best, most surreal weeks ever!  I got to experience the first day of school at Poky High all over again—25 years after my senior year. The red and the blue, the football team, the class yells, the Indianettes breaking their arrows with the crescendo of traditional fight songs, and all of the buzz still have me smiling.  This time I went with slightly less acne, a few more pounds, a presumably more hip hair style and surprisingly the same amount of first-day jitters.

I’ve gotten to know second year principal Lisa Delonas through volunteering with my alma mater’s  gay-straight alliance club last year. Even after going through the paperwork to volunteer and getting all of the approvals, protocol requires me to check into the office each time. Frankly, I love this protocol.  The ladies in the PHS office are as nice as the ladies who were there 25 years ago. Their energy and genuine care for students always has me parting in a better mood.  I wish high school could feel like that for everyone.

When I first met Mrs. Delonas, it was liberating to step into the principal’s office as a grown up. The last time I sat in that visitor’s chair at Pocatello High School, Dr. Carole McWilliam was shaking her finger at me for wasting time trying to weasel out of physics. And while this engineer has since thanked Dr. McWilliam for that, I’ve also appreciated the physics-free nature of my talks with Mrs. Delonas.  

The first thing I noticed in Mrs. Delonas’ office was a bumper sticker on her bookshelf. I saw that same sticker when I showed up at Poky for the first day of volleyball tryouts. It was on the right side of Valerie Draper’s brown Ford Tempo. “PHS Where everybody IS somebody.”  I believed it then and I believe it now.

Last spring while we were not talking about physics, Mrs. Delonas asked if I would welcome this year’s students on the first day of school and help kick off the year’s theme: Living the Legacy. Would I?  Absolutely!

High school was easy for me to love. I was athletic and played the trombone. I was friendly and not prone to anxiety or depression.  My haircut and mannerisms may have prompted “dyke” and “fag” to be scribbled on my campaign posters during a successful bid for student body president, but it didn’t faze me. What did faze me, however, was the type of human beings who attended Poky with me. I invited the entire class of 1991 to rejoin me on this year’s first day of school.

Many locals couldn’t miss work, and out of town classmates extended regrets, but our class still wanted to contribute.  Many sent well wishes and financial donations so we could have Stuart’s Media Group digitize, brighten, and reinstall our class picture that hangs near the main office. We also wanted each student to have that same bumper sticker that Mrs. Delonas keeps in her office, so  Stuart’s helped us with that, too.  

My 10 classmates who joined me at Poky this week to hand out almost 1,000 bumper stickers while I spoke were a coincidental and serendipitous representation of Poky’s enduring diversity. We had athletes, band members, drill teamers, cheer leaders, class-skippers, and over achievers, but none of these people were necessarily my friends in high school.  I can’t help but wonder what I missed in not knowing each of these people better 25 years ago. 

I begged this year’s students to take risks on building friendships.  How are friendships forged? Somebody makes the first move. Somebody offers the first smile with eye contact. Somebody opens the door. And there they were, sitting on the bleachers at PHS--where everybody is somebody.

 As students accepted bumper stickers (extras are in the office), I hope they saw the Class of 1991’s smiles, and I hope they could see glimpses of their current and future selves. We not only made it through Pocatello High School, but we thrived and we still swell with Poky Pride.

I hope this year’s student see that when somebody’s gotta do it, they can be that somebody. Once they let their classmates and teachers; the athletes, choir, band and drama members; the math geeks, debaters and every other somebody at PHS surround and support them, Poky Pride will consume them and that pride never dies. 

Twenty five years later, Poky’s class of 1991 is counting on you students today. We won’t be back at Poky tomorrow, but you will. We’ll go to work and continue raising our kids and living about in our community letting our Poky Pride permeate the other areas of our lives. You are living the legacy now.  Live it. Love it. Be it.

Partners in Kind

published in the Idaho State Journal on August 9, 2015.

I was delighted to see the July 26 font page of the ISJ. The headline just below the fold read, “Moms work to reach sixth-grade girls.“  I had a feeling this story would be coming, and I knew it would be good. As I read along I kept thinking, “I know them!  I know them!”

I first met Courtney Fisher and Rainbow Maldonado when we were sophomores at Poky. We played junior varsity basketball together, and by “played”, I mean we sat the bench and cheered. Although, I got to go in sometimes to set a screen because I was one of the big girls, but for the most part, we didn’t see much playing time. Apart from basketball, we ran in different, albeit friendly circles and didn’t get to know each other until 20 years later while planning our high school reunion. 

I was in charge of the July event and a few months before, I suffered a head injury when I boarded a bus to take my middle school math club to Boise. I played rugby for nine years without incident, but one fateful day with the mathletes and I incur 11 nights in the hospital, miss nine and a half weeks of work and accrue $50,000 in hospital bills. Thank God for insurance. And thank God for Rainbow and Courtney. 

 

On Facebook, they could see from my status updates and hospital gown pictures that I wasn’t making any progress on our reunion.  Courtney messaged me offering to take over the main dinner planning. Not only did she want to help, but she also had ideas to make our dinner better and with Rainbow’s assistance, they did just that. That’s one of the things I love about these women. They are geared up to contribute. They aren’t passengers in the boat, but rather crewmates wielding a paddle with a passion and fueled for forward motion.  

I don’t see Courtney and Rainbow as often as they see each other, but we keep in touch and meet for an occasional lunch or cup of coffee. During one such get-together with Rainbow last winter, we realized our mutual feelings of “kids these days need more from us” and “what can we do?”  That’s when she told me about the Finding Kind documentary and accompanying Kind Campaign program aimed at middle school girls.   A family in town had just lost a daughter to suicide and another had lost one the year before. Do you see this Pocatello? Chubbuck? Southeast Idaho? Our community has lost two girls under the age of 16 in the last 18 months to suicide. TWO.

So when people wonder why this program is so specific and why these moms pursued it, I imagine that’s partly why.  In addition to watching their own daughters navigate pre-teen challenges and social circles, they’ve seen what’s happened in our community. Data and experience suggest that this demographic could use extra guidance in dealing with exactly what the Finding Kind documentary and accompanying Kind Campaign curriculum addresses: “physical fighting, name-calling, threats, power struggles, competition, manipulation, secrets, rumors, and ostracizing other girls.”  How do we stop these behaviors and how to we help girls cope with them when they occur?

As Courtney and Rainbow approached the Mayor’s office and the school district for support and collaboration with the Kind Campaign, they learned of other initiatives in the community also centered around kindness and how we treat each other. A few stakeholders convened and Kind Community was born.

Becoming a part of the Kind Community collaborative isn’t a pledge toward perfection. It’s a commitment to celebrate each of our diverse efforts to uphold and bolster a shared vision for creating and ensuring just that—a Kind Community. We—that’s right—we seek to promote and connect one another working toward similar goals. I’m thrilled to be a part of this collective even though I also feel a great vulnerability every time I publicly advocate kindness.

What my pup decides to chew in the morning, new shoe or dog bone, may affect my capacity for kindness on any given day. I succumb all the time to the humanistic dangers of ego, pride, and a personal investment in being right. It’s important for engineers to get things right, and I forget (or ignore) that sometimes there is no right when feelings are involved. Like any campaign there will be missteps and interpersonal struggles, but believe me. The heart and soul behind Kind Community love southeast Idaho and want to proactively engage groups and individuals to share resources and leverage relationships for the greater good.

Is a Kind Community important to you? If so, please consider becoming one of the many partners in kind. For more information, email kindcommunity2015@gmail.com or like Kind Community on Facebook. 

She let me love him

It’s been almost 30 years since I signed a Father’s Day card. I’ve written about how my dad didn’t pay taxes or child support and how his love of beer and cigarettes led to an early death, but he was my dad. And I loved him.

Since he died when I was 13, I never really got him anything for Father’s Day. Of course, I gave him little gifts, but my mom always bought them and ushered the signing of a card. Mom made no bones about his shortcomings or her frustrations with him, but without hesitance she encouraged and fostered my relationship with my father. 

I have storybook memories of Dad. He took me fishing at Twin Lakes. We’d stop at a gas station on the way and he’d get a quart of buttermilk, orange circus peanuts and Budweiser. I got chocolate milk. We never got sunscreen. I hated the actual fishing from the worms to the wiggling fish, but I’m sure my love of chocolate milk stems from those moments. One time when I caught a fish and screeched as it squirmed, Dad laughed. He told me I was just like that in my mom’s belly and that’s why he called me “Bluegill” before I was born.

On weekends when I’d visit him, I hung out in his bar in Lava Hot Springs. I had my own pool cue, and when it wasn’t busy he’d set me up with a Shirley Temple and a bag of Cheetoes, and I’d shoot at the cue ball while singing with the juke box. I knew my escape route and hiding places if the authorities came in, and I knew all of Crystal Gayle’s “Don’t it make my Brown Eyes Blue” before I knew the Pledge of Allegiance.

Dad would come to Pocatello now and then and he’d take me to North’s Chuck Wagon Buffet at the Pine Ridge Mall. Kids’ meals cost a quarter for every year. I watched my meals go up in 25 cent increments each birthday. When he’d drop me off at home, he pretended to empty his wallet and give me “spending money.” I’d run into the house waving 11 one-dollar bills as he backed out of the driveway. “Look what Dad gave me! Isn’t he great?” Mom would smile and swear under her breath and wonder where he was when I needed winter boots. 

Dad’s lung cancer diagnosis came in the middle of my sixth grade year. I gave him two polo shirts for that Father’s Day. One had thick red and grey stripes and the other was bold teal strips separated by thin black lines.

At the end of seventh grade when he had his left lung removed, he came to stay with us until he could go back to Lava on his own.  I don’t remember if he ever went back to Lava. The infection where his cancerous lung had been was so severe that the doctors left a drain tube in his chest. He had to wear a bandage wrapped around his torso, and when he coughed, it would be soaked. Mom had to change it for him a few times a day, and to make that easier, Dad only wore button-up shirts after that. He gave me his Father’s Day polos, and when Mom sewed turtle buttons on the teal one, I wore that  baggy men’s shirt for my school picture.

Dad stayed on our couch for months, and I resented having to share the TV with him. I hadn’t thought anything could be more boring than fishing until he started to watch it on TV. I barely got a peep out of my mouth to complain when Mom yanked me into the kitchen. She made it crystal clear that he would never fish again, so I needed to just sit with him and be still while he dreamed.  So I did.

The things kids are supposed to get out of their parents marriage—a modeling of compassion and forgiveness, witnessing love and compromise—I got out of my parents’ divorce. Mom probably spent more time mad at my dad than not, and I imagine she spent Father’s Days gritting her teeth and biting her tongue, but it was worth it.

I remember my dad’s finer qualities and truly appreciate him in part because of my mom.  She let me fish without sun screen and play pool in a seedy bar. She let me squeal over spending money and sport too-big shirts. In spite of their relationship and his downfalls, on Father’s Day and every day, she let me love him.

  

Happy Father’s Day to all the different dads out there. And unless you’re watching fishing from the couch, please apply some sunscreen today.

Dad's 44th birthday holding his little "Bluegill"

Dragon Slayers and Lovers of this World

“Anyone can slay a dragon ...but try waking up every morning and loving the world all over again. That's what takes a real hero.” –Brian Andreas

My Facebook feed has been alive like a noxious weed this week. After Caitlyn Jenner’s Vanity Fair cover was announced, the tendrils of commentary have been hard to avoid. As a few friends voiced opinions I didn’t agree with, I did something I don’t normally do on social media. I challenged them just a touch. The central theme that irked me is the opinion that Caitlyn Jenner is not a hero and that she is undeserving of ESPN’s Arthur Ash Award for Courage. 

So, how does one define a hero and courage? The words are like beauty—subjective and in the eye of the beholder.  

Brian Andreas is an artist and writer from Iowa and he has a knack for capturing a thousand words in only a few. As I thought about courage and heroes this week and how I would define them, I recalled Brian’s quote above. I love the simplicity in his words. I love that he recognizes a wide-spread notion of a typical hero being a mighty dragon slayer of sorts but that heroism lies in accomplishing something difficult and for many it can be most difficult to love and keep loving.

Caitlyn Jenner’s announcement this week happened days before I traveled to Boise for a scholarship reception. This winter I helped review applications and conduct scholarship interviews for the Pride Foundation. The Pride Foundation is a regional community foundation that inspires giving to expand opportunities and advance full equality for lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, and queer (LGBTQ) people across the Northwest. 

I have been waiting for years for an opportunity like this. My entire college education including books, fees, room and board was paid for through scholarships from Idaho State University, engineering technical societies, and organizations dedicated to the advancement of women in the workplace. While I have donated to numerous scholarship funds over the years, I have never been involved in the application review and award process until now.  

This year the Pride Foundation awarded $403,850 to 124 student leaders in Alaska, Idaho, Montana, Oregon and Washington. Nine scholars are from Idaho, collectively being awarded over $34,000, and I got to meet four of them this week. Two of them, similar to Caitlyn Jenner, identify as transgender. As I met people and mingled with other foundation supporters, I was acutely aware of the courage in the room.

Melissa Vera was one of the LGBTQ winners who I helped interview over a video conference call. In person and after the stress of the review process, I was struck by her humor, candor and resilience. During her speech she said, “My mother was a meth-addict for ten years and I grew up not knowing where my next meal would come from or if we would have to move into the car yet again because rent wasn’t paid. My circumstances during that time didn’t instill much confidence in the world and myself. I had to deal with physical violence in the home, hunger, neglect and a constant feeling of stress and fear. As I grew up, I had to realize that I never lost that raw innocence and hope. “

Another winner was Dianne Piggott, a transgender woman from Boise. While she received her scholarship medal the night’s host said “As a transgender woman, she has gained valuable insight into change and valuing an authentic life. Though she didn’t grow up in Idaho, she assures us she got here as soon as she could.” 

I talked with a third scholarship winner from Boise named Kale Gardner. Kale was kicked out of the house while in high school and has found a family to live with while attending the summer session at the College of Western Idaho, majoring in sociology. When I asked if the rest of the evening would be full of late night celebrations and revelry, Kale simply said, “Well, I have homework to do.” 

All of these folks had smiles and sparkles that showcased, if not their love of this world today, their attempts at such. For me, I have heroes who try to make this a safer and more loving world, and I have heroes who help me love it when it’s not. I see heroes who do just as Brian Andres says and they wake up every day loving the world.  

As I’ve followed Bruce Jenner’s transition to Caitlyn and as I think about those I met this week, that’s what I see: people who are trying to live in a way that lets them be their authentic self and love this world. Is Caitlyn Jenner a hero to me? Well not exactly. She’s a heroine.

Pride Foundation Scholarship winners with pink ribbons: Kolby Deagle, Melissa Vera, Dianne Piggott and Kale Gardner. Pride Foundation Idaho Regional Development Organizer Steve Martin in the middle.