I’m situated within the spread of eight children in the upper middle, and the oldest of four boys. My parents are made from multiple divorces, remarriages, and continued breeding habits. Being the middle child with three problematic siblings as the book ends did have advantages. I could leave for days and neither side of parental guardians nor the book ends took notice. My multiplicity of parental figures only greased the squeaky wheels and never the smoothly running hubs in the middle. I suppose they didn’t have to. What is the long-term effect? I want to think I’m self-starting, self-sufficient, and a good parent, but I’m also biased in opinion.
Raised mostly in the backcountry of Montana. At one point, I attended a school slightly larger than one room. My education, mostly, came from very diminutive resources that included hundreds of past due public and school library books with Scholastic Book fairs as an occasional carrot.
None of the parents had anchors for any employment currents they floated upon, not while I was a kid. Nor was I a model student, possibly because of all the moving and instability; but I don’t believe that. Anyways, ten different schools that I remember can be associated with my attendance, before three high schools in three states. All those schools devoted to my youth in some way and believe me, I wouldn’t change a thing; although, I, like everyone else, can’t help wondering what might have been. But also like most, I’m over it.
During my youth, I never lacked anything that I did not learn to acquire. Food, shelter, cars, I found each obtainable. From the time I was twelve I worked, by lying about my age. Doing so seemed obvious since that seemed my place, a worker bee meant to serve the hive. But along the way, somehow, memorable teachers reached out and pointed me towards something else, something I would have to reconcile to become an adult.
Public school teachers. Not all of them disliked my filthy, non-ironed, and ragged sighting enough to not say “Tim” you’re going to do great! A few sacrificed their daily norms and influenced me greatly. They demonstrated compassion even though not paid to do so. A few of them wasted enough of their time with the new kid to make the positive, life-long impressions this kid needed, and those impressions accumulated.
It was somewhere in one of the many middle schools a science teacher recommended that I begin keeping a journal. It allowed me to record ideas and concepts to research later. Plus, it made me write. But I'll not ever claim superior writing ability, that I am not. However, keeping the journals did force me to become experienced in problem-solving and conducting research. Today, at my current vintage, the ideas don’t come as fast but the journals I’ve kept still produce stuff I love to work on. I do admit most of my journal topics perish to their research, but not all have. That is especially true for my climate work. When your right your right.
It was somewhere in my senior year of high school all those good teachers and their impressions coupled into a shockingly good SAT score. Yes, I studied for it. Even scraping enough money to buy a good SAT guidebook. The problem was, it was late in the teenage game and I had no hope whatsoever to pay for college nor the grades for academic scholarship. Worse yet, I did not have the money for their application fees. So, I did what anybody trying to break out of being limited in a social caste, being poor that is. I took the only somewhat desperate option available.
I took the required tests, did surprisingly well again, picked my job from the list, and volunteered in the U.S. Army. That took months for me to decide. Meanwhile, I was bagging groceries, repairing cars, tossing hay bails, and cutting grass for money. But I finally put down my baseball-equipped dreams of youth, a small group of friends, and joined. Man did I like it. Three meals a day, exercise, and very interesting people to work around. Oh sure, it had many downsides like the very interesting people to work around; but my first years in the military were fantastic, but naive. But all good things end as maturity continues to develop. So as many global calamities and political disappointments continued to kill the hapless for being ignorant, I decided to opt out of taking part. I accepted that ego-driven politicians and not the Army would end my military career. So, after fulfilling my ten-year agreement, honorably discharged, and empowered to enter a new vocation I moved along, happily.
My wife and kids and my first professional job all stuck well to my campaign of achieving adulthood here in Oregon. I guess it was in Central Texas and during college that all started to go well. For several years after the Army, I spent the highly inadequate GI bill, taught non-credited classes, tutored, attended classes, worked for myself, and topped it all off by attempting to help a greedy father who ultimately stole from me to support his wine, woman, and song lifestyle. I did manage a four point oh academic scholarship and then a government internship. So after student loans, absolutely nothing mention-able from my parents, my lovely spouse helping support me and the kids, and, I’m very, very proud to have earned my Engineering degree with honors. All of which eventually moved me forward to here and now, doing what I was meant to do, climate research.
The short version of this bio; well that’s easily summarized. Raised free range as a middle child. Thanks to public school teachers, I survived the peer pressure predators and eventually escaped the repeat offenders and a flock of wild siblings. I survived again, this time, the politician-driven Army’s attempt to find a place for me to die. But I grew some wisdom from the better Army experiences. So, both good and bad had matured me. Eventually, the young man shaped into academics and the beginnings of a family. So now as an adult, I’m a father who’s all grown-up and living the outdoor dream of an Oregonian. A man full enough of himself to believe he is righteous in words and acts. A nonfictional author who wants to tell his fictional stories too; Hmm, maybe writing a fictional story could be a self-prescribed therapy for having to share the nonfictional news forced upon me by the complete mitigation study? No, I don't have time to externalize dreams. Dealing with today's climate reality is far too demanding, there is so much still to do.
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