The ROLE MODELS and INFLUENTIAL PEOPLE IN MY LIFE

Consider this:

      In life, one comes into contact with a great variety of people. Many of these people can have a degree of influence on how we grow up, learn, cope and become distinct individuals.

      When looking at the agents for change and development, different processes, distinct apologists and those matters that resonate with an individual’s inherent belief systems are of paramount importance to consider when doing this exercise.

      I have created a list of 25 categories of people that could have had an influence or significant impact on your life. I invite you to download it and use it to identify and discuss those compelling persons that you have come across so far in your life. If you wish, send your results back to me and I will post it on my blog.

Click Here to download the list in Microsoft Word .docx format or
Click Here to download it as an Adobe .pdf file.
There are instructions and suggestions included with the list.

Here is my completed list for your entertainment.

  1) Those that one wishes to emulate: there is no person I wish to emulate so I will have to put my own name down: Paul

  2) Those that one feels an affinity for: all veterans because the world is scary unpredictable place and the entire population of some countries are devoted to and commanded to bring about the destruction of America and death to all infidels (non-Muslims). The only thing that stands between our annihilation and survival is the military. They deserve great respect and gratitude. In my opinion, any negative actions or wrongdoing of the military is not a fault with the military but with America’s defective political system. 

  3) Those whose work ethic appeals to us: Brian Geenbaur because of his diligence in performing his work and his respect for all people. Also, his selfless acts of kindness. Richard Feynman for his stick-to-it-ness, his sense of humor and his ability to come up with many different ways to solve any one problem. 

  4)  Parents: My parent’s provided me with the basic necessities when I was a child.

  5) Children: I enjoy an excellent quality relationship with my children. Our relationship is miles above the average person’s experience. I am very connected to my kids and enjoy their company and look forward to seeing them often. I have unconditional love for them and am I happy that I have them in my life. Anyone who says they don’t want children would change their mind if they had kids like mine.   

  6)  Siblings: My siblings are all so different from each other yet they are all on the periphery of my social circle. I see them only on the occasional Sunday when I visit my parent’s house at those times that they also there visiting. There is cordial interaction when we see each other but nothing more significant than superficial conversation can be expected. 

  7) Mentors: I have not ever had a person in my life that would call a mentor. Since I have to come up with an answer, I would have to say that my mentor has been my own sense of self.  

  8) Teachers: I had a social studies teacher in the 11^th grade named Lorraine Berlin. She was quite remarkable and she is the only teacher that ever impressed to any degree. She was fascinating to listen to and her demeanor was that of a person with great self-confidence. Her knowledge went far beyond the one discipline of social studies. She had an amazing grasp of the country’s political system and had worked with some very prominent politicians in the past. Her “serious sanguine” attitude was inspiring and I always paid attention to everything she taught. Interestingly, she was the wife of the base commander of the Air Station in Karamursel Turkey. She had a daughter in the same grade as me and her daughter shared many of her best qualities.

  9) Coaches: I have never played any type of sport and have never had any kind of coach. Since I am supposed to have an answer in every category, I will say that my coach was my personal trainer (I don’t remember his name) when I was weight training in the late eighties and early nineties. Actually, I guess he was very much like a couch, I just never thought of it that way. 

  10) Instructors: Instructors seem like teachers but I guess they could be different. To me, an instructor is someone who shows you how to do something only once or perhaps on an ongoing basis but without any schedule or organization. In this category, I would name Richard Huberdault. He taught me a lot about wood working, the basics of electrical work, and plumbing. His can-do attitude made him a natural instructor. He introduced me to the practice of being a handyman. He was the impetus that sparked my willingness to attempt to repair or take on any kind of project whether I had past experience with it or not. As a result, after many years I developed my own attitude in regard to being a jack-of-all-trades with the motto:  “how hard can it be”?

  11) Moral guidance: this is tricky one. I didn’t receive any useful moral guidance from my parents beyond the general concepts associated with the golden rule. Neither did I glean moral guidance from the Catholic Catechism I attended until the age 14. Throughout life, I have been exposed to teachings and precepts designed to provide me with morals but I haven’t found any extrinsic influence to be of any value. Uh, does anyone know what the word catechism means?

  12) Consultants: The only people I can associate with this category are business consultants. I have had a few QuickBooks experts come to the office to help me with problems and/or to learn new skills. Unfortunately, those experiences weren’t as helpful as I’d hoped and certainly not worth the cost involved.

  13) Religious persons or organizations: Obviously, Jesus of Nazareth tops this list. Well, no - not really. Just kidding. In this category, only one experience comes to mind and that is the many years I was a member of the Unitarian Universalist Society of Grafton and Upton.  I was very involved in the church and its activities, as well as the social aspects of belonging to a group. I was involved in almost every aspect of the church including religious education, adult discussion groups, fundraising, community involvement, the selection of a new minister and I was a trustee on the Board of trustees.  I derived a lot of satisfaction and social skills from my ten or so years as a member of the church.

 14) Philosophers: There are too many philosophers that I have admired at some point in my life that naming one or more is difficult. Any that comes to mind would simply be those that can I thought of on the spur of the moment and would not be in any order or represent any greater significance than any other. Right now, Bertrand Russell and Niels Bohr come to mind.

  15) Authority figures: Another difficult category. I’m not so keen on authority figures. I will, however, name Eric (the Chief of Police in Barre, MA) and Hillary Clinton.

  16) Political figures: I may have jumped the gun a little because Hillary Clinton is definitely in this category. Also: Jimmy Carter, Bill Clinton and Michelle Obama.

  17) Scientists: This is a very easy category and I could list dozens, but here are some of my favorites: Sam Harris, Lawrence Kraus, Stephen Hawking, Max Planck, Albert Einstein, Richard Feynman, Brian Greene, Brian Cox and Edwin Hubble

  18) Authors: Brian Christian, Christopher Hitchens, Michael Shermer, Michio Kaku and Bill Bryson.

  19) Artists: I don’t know why but I don’t have any favorite artists.  Marcel Mouly and Jacques-Louis David are the only two that come to mind.

  20) Musicians (composers): Cher, Yoko Ono, Madonna, Allen, me

  21) Explorers: I don’t care much for the explorers of the past. They pretty much just brought God and disease with them wherever they “discovered” something. But since I have to answer, I’ll say the Voyager Satellites.

  22) Inventors: Well, I’d like to thank all the inventors that make life comfortable and interesting, however, I don’t know their names. I will have to list Nikola Tesla 

  23) Intellectuals: I think the philosophers and scientists I listed earlier would also double as my intellectuals. Otherwise I might list my daughter Sarah.

  24) Those in service (to community or country): All veterans, police and firefighters. Especially the veterans who serve their country and return to find that they’re no longer of any use to society.  

  25) Successful business persons: Bill Gates (Microsoft), Jeff Bezos (Amazon), Tim Cook (Apple), Allen Dion,  and many others.

   26)   I'm adding Dreamers to my list. Not the kind that waste their lives dreaming of foolishness or unobtainable things. But rather, the kind that have dreams and strive to make them come true. I name Allen Dion.

Coming to a blog near you...

I'm working on my next blog post. No really, I am.

Side Note: November's electrical generation is expected to be 488.1 kwh.
That's a little less than the last report, but there's less sun at this time of year.

The Cake Bully

In August of 1990, I got a new job working as a social worker for an agency that provided services to people with developmental disabilities. There came a day during my first week on the job that a ‘group birthday’ event occurred. Each month, anyone with a birthday in that month was given a birthday shout-out and the staff would have cake at the end of the staff meeting. As it turned out, my birthday was only a few days after being hired, so I was included in that month’s birthday celebration. I don’t know how they knew my birthday was in August, but they did.

I didn’t know about the cake.

The staff meeting was held in the central office area; it was quite a large space. Everyone sat along the perimeter of the room and there were a lot of people, I’m guessing about 40. At that time, I was in a super-duper fitness-crazed frenzy and I didn’t eat sugar or white flour. 

At the end of the meeting, the birthday cake was cut and pieces were handed out to each person by a staff member. Her name isn’t important, so there’s no reason to single her out now by name. (Sheila Camfry)

When she got around to handing me a piece of cake, I said, “No, thank you.” She then said, “It’s your birthday, have a piece of cake.” But I said, “No, I don’t eat cake but thanks anyway.” Not to be deterred, she then says, “Take the cake, it’s your birthday,” and she says this without a smile. She’s visibly annoyed with me and still has her arm stretched out in front of me with the cake on a paper plate. Apparently, this agency takes their cake very seriously, and now I’m in an awkward situation. Everyone in the room sees and hears the interaction and I feel their eyes on me, awaiting my next move.

(Oddly enough, this picture looks remarkably like cake-Sheila)

It’s my first week on the job. I’m getting a lot of unwanted attention. I’m feeling uncomfortable and I don’t know what else to do so I take the cake. I now have to decide what to DO with the cake. I don’t want to eat it, so I sit there with a piece of cake in hand for the duration of birthday situation. At some point, I mechanically walk over to the trash can and throw the cake away.

As the cake confrontation is occurring, I happen to look straight across the room and see a woman with dark hair and she’s watching the scene, a slight smile on her face. For some reason, I make a somewhat playful grimace. She starts to laugh. I felt like laughing too but the cake bully is still standing over me with the CAKE waiting for me to acquiesce.

After the meeting, and I am free of the cake, the smiling woman comes over and says something funny about the drama, and I knew right away that we were going to be friends. Her name was also Sheila, but she was a good Sheila, not a wicked Sheila. 

We did, in fact, become very good friends. During our first conversation she said, “I was waiting to see what was going to happen with that cake”! And she offers a couple of possibilities, one being the wicked Sheila throwing the cake into my lap. Another being me refusing the cake again and wondering what would then happen. Of course another refusal might have made bad-Sheila lose her cake attack, therefore be humiliated in front of everyone for failing at cake distribution.

Looking back, I now know that cake-Sheila was known for being a little odd. Apparently, if I’d refused the cake again, a lot of the people in the room would have been entertained watching her reactions and see her frustrations grow. It turns out that many of them were disappointed with the lack of fireworks as the cake situation was in play. 

Of course, I didn’t know any of this at the time. I knew that between me and strange-Sheila, one of us would be considered in line with the established group dynamic. But I only had a few days to become acquainted with the people there and I didn’t know about cake etiquette.

In hindsight, I think it would have been better to take the cake when offered. After all, I didn’t have to eat it. (Although cake-bully-Sheila might have had an accomplice sitting near me who would have noticed that I wasn’t eating it) 

But I think there was some part of me that wanted everyone to know that I didn’t eat empty calories. I may have thought that it gave me some bragging rights. But in the end, it just made my first impression on many of the staff an awkward one. I will try to be more gracious the next time I am offered something trivial that I really don’t want. That is, unless it’s cake.

Does this make sense to anyone...?

In better news, here's some data from my Solar Power System data reports...

My Preferred Timetable

2:00 a.m. through 4:00 a.m.  I’m always asleep between these hours no matter what else may be going on. I don’t think I’ve ever seen the clock showing any time between these hours unless there was an extreme event occurring.

5:00 a.m. is too early to get up. If I get up before 5:30 a.m. my circadian rhythm will be disrupted and the effects of that interruption can last for days.

5:30 a.m. is too early to get up in the morning but if awake at this time it’s OK to get up.

6:00 a.m. is not too early to get up in the morning and is the time I am most likely to naturally awake.

7:00 a.m. wouldn't be too late to get up in the morning.

7:30 a.m. is the latest time I can wake up in the morning without adverse effects on my circadian rhythm and is the earliest time of day that I can eat food, but usually don’t.

8:30 a.m. is time to take morning medications.

8:30 a.m. (on Sundays only) is the time for pancakes.

8:35 a.m. is the time to allow the routines of the day to start and the earliest time I will normally open my office door (where I have been avoiding the start of the day).

8:35 a.m. is when I hope that the day’s routines don’t start without having to avoid them, and/or time to avoid beginning the day's usual routines.

8:45 a.m. would be a good time to eat food if hungry, but I'm not usually hungry.

9:00 a.m. is the earliest time of day that I am somewhat comfortable being asked a question.

9:30 a.m. is a good time to start a project or leave the house for appointments or errands/chores.

10:00 a.m. is the latest time in the morning that I would be comfortable with beginning a project or leaving the house.

10:30 a.m. (on intermittent Sundays) is the time to leave to visit my parents.

11:00 a.m. is the time to take mid-day medications.

12:00 p.m. is generally a very nice time of day.

3:00 p.m. is the time to take afternoon medications.

4:00 p.m. would be the best time to end work, projects, or be out of the house.

4:45 p.m. is the latest time to be working or be out of the house.

5:00 p.m. is my preferred time to eat supper and watch TV.

5:15 p.m. - 8:00 p.m. is when I consume the bulk of my day's calories.

8:00 p.m. - 8:30 p.m. is when I like to stop watching TV.

8:15 p.m. is usually the time that I use the computer for writing, research, entertainment and/or work or play the keyboard.

9:30 p.m. is the time to take evening medications.

10:00 p.m. is bedtime.

10:30 p.m. is already too late to go to bed, and possible circadian rhythm problems can occur if I am not asleep by this time.

10:45 p.m. If I’m still awake at this time it means I’m not going to fall asleep anytime soon and that my circadian rhythm has been disrupted. The effects can last days.