Folks,
I guess that as long as I have been administering our class web site, I have tried to stay in the background and let it be about all of us. That said, when I posted Larry Lindell’s “30 year update”, I realized that I never posted my own, and that I should take the opportunity to tell my story. After we graduated from West, I stayed in Coralville and went to the U of I. I got a Bachelor of Science degree in General Science, with a Physics and Chemistry Emphasis. I had also taken enough Education courses to get a teaching certificate, and had planned to teach secondary school science.
Fate stepped in my senior year, though, and my life has taken quite a different turn. While I was in the U of I Career center, looking at the job postings for science teachers, I saw one for teachers at the Naval Nuclear Power School in Orlando. I thought it would be cool to get out of Iowa, live in Florida, and teach heavy-duty science to the folks in what then was a high tech, cutting edge profession. I talked to the Navy, and they said that while didn’t have the course work to be an instructor, I would make a dandy student. Of course, I fell for the old “join the Navy and see the world” line, and wound up seeing it though a periscope! After Officer candidate school in Newport RI, Nuclear Power School in Orlando, and prototype training in Saratoga Springs New York, I was a Naval officer for three years on a ballistic missile submarine. These boats have two crews, so I spent half my time in Groton, CT, and the other half on my boat either at sea or docked in Holy Loch, Scotland.
I met my wife, Bobbi, while I was hiking on Mt. Monadnock in New Hampshire. She was from the Boston area, and when we got married we settled in Braintree, MA. When I got our of the Navy I put my nuclear knowledge to work at the Pilgrim Nuclear Power Station in Plymouth, MA. I got my Senior Reactor Operators license and worked in the Operator Training Department for 5 years. After that, I moved to the Engineering Department where I found my “true calling” as a Systems and Safety Analysis engineer. I’ve been very happy in the job, never bored, working on all kinds of cool, geeky stuff. Bobbi had gotten her Bachelors degree in Biology, and worked as a Medical Technologist until our son Henry was born in 1983. Bobbi chose to stay at home and raise Henry and Bessie, definitely the most demanding of all careers. When the kids were small we moved from Braintree to Franklin, MA, where we have been ever since.
Both of our kids basically grew up in Franklin, and Bobbi got involved with the schools as they moved through the system. As Bessie was finishing high school, Bobbi got her Masters degree in Educational Research, Measurement, and Evaluation at Boston college. She’s been working for the last couple of years at a non-profit educational think tank called The Concord Consortium in Concord MA, but she’ll be starting a really cool job soon in the Franklin school district. Henry’s a junior at Wheaton College in Norton MA. He’s majoring in Religion and Philosophy, and he’ll be studying in Ireland from January to June of 2004 as his Junior Semester Abroad!
Henry’s very happy in his studies, and it’s nice that all of us in the family support his long-term goal of becoming a College Professor of Religion and / or Philosophy. He’s always been a natural born teacher, and he would definitely be the “cool professor” on campus. He works in the computer support center at Wheaton and loves technology, and he would be someone who could bring together these normally disparate, warring camps and show his students how we can all use technology to bring people together in a supportive, nurturing sense of community.
Life has been a real challenge for our daughter Bessie for about a year. It was about a year ago that we all became aware that she was struggling with some inner forces that were proving too much for her to manage. We all have been working closely with Bessie’s mental health therapist and psychiatrist, and we’ve come to understand that Bessie is living with Bipolar Disorder (it used to be called Manic-Depressive), as well as an broad array of anxiety related disorders. She’s been hospitalized many times in the past year, including two long hospitalizations at McLean Hospital in Belmont, MA. This is the hospital that the true life basis for the hospital portrayed in the Winona Ryder movie “Girl Interrupted”. With a humor and grace under fire that she’s shown through the whole ordeal, Bessie told us that she was in a adolescent girl’s treatment program similar to the program the author of the book “Girl Interrupted” was treated in. She also showed us the tunnels that run between the buildings, and told us that there really is a now abandoned bowling alley in the original main building of the hospital complex.
She graduated from Franklin High School, and started Simmons College this fall. However, she had to take a medical leave from Simmons once her symptoms got worse. Simmons gave her up to two years to return, and she’s hoping to resume her college education sometime within that window. She’s a tough, smart girl, and she’s determined to get what she wants out of life, considering what she’s dealing with!
I’ve really enjoyed being the Webmaster for our class over the years. This summer was quite difficult for us, and it made me feel really good that I could help our class to have such a successful impromptu reunion. It’s been wonderful to re-connect with so many classmates, and I’ve really needed and valued the caring and support so many of you have given me and my family.
I hope everyone has a happy holiday season, and can enjoy the blessings of home and family.
Dave
