After I graduated High School, I decided to go to college at the University of Southern Maine.  Ultimately, my decided major was Electrical Engineering.  College was HARD, but I eventually hit my stride and I was getting A’s and B’s in my Electrical Engineering classes (and not doing TOO bad in my other classes after Freshman Year).

But Junior year was easily the worst year.  When you are an Electrical Engineering major, Junior year means two semesters of Electronics, appropriately (if not creatively) named “Electronics I” and “Electronics II”.

The Electrical Engineering Department was small; there was less than fifteen of us in my class.  The next class up only had about five students, and several of us befriended them during our Sophmore (their Junior) year.  That was their year to take Electronics.  Their class was first thing in the morning for a couple of hours, two days a week, followed by a lab that was “two hours” long.  I put that in quotes, because the reality was that the labs were so difficult and complicated that they would be there most of the day completing their work.  That’s probably one reason we befriended them despite not sharing classes; they were around the lab a lot.

For our Junior year, a change was made.  Our class was two hours, two days a week, but didn’t start until four in the afternoon.  So after a day of other classes we had to absorb this monster, and then try to do the labs in an evening.

I’m not intending to sound whiny, but trying to paint a picture of just how difficult this class was.  I think every major probably has one class that falls into the “monster” category, and this was ours.  I didn’t have the best time with it, but I put in the work with my lab group and studied for tests both alone and with the various study groups that formed within our class.

Around the beginning of December, towards the end of “Electronics I”, we each had progress meetings with the professor to see how we were doing.  I knew I wasn’t excelling, but I felt like I was doing ok, probably in the “B” range, B- at the worst.

Turns out I was getting a C-.  In college, at least at USM, when you are getting less than a C or C+ (I forget which one) in a class that is in the same department as your major, it is considered failing.  Due to being a class in a small department at a small college, this class was only offered in the fall, so it would be a whole year before I could catch up.  Not to mention that all of the other classes required a passing grade in this one.  So if I failed, I was basically stuck for a year.  Well, I could take some of the non-electrical engineering classes, but I was still looking at graduating a year later than planned.
So the question became, could I actually pass?  There was only a couple of weeks left until finals.  The final was pretty much the only thing left.  I told one of my lab partners/friends that I was probably just going to stop going to class.  Why bother?  I hated this class.  Besides being difficult, I didn’t find the material terribly interesting.  The professor was from Turkey and had kind of a weird, mumbly accent that made his lectures tough for me to follow.

Well, I cooled off, and decided that I couldn’t just quit.  There was only two weeks left anyway, and I still had the final.  Would it be enough?

I studied my butt off for this thing.  Alone and with my classmates, like I had with the others.  But A LOT more than usual on my own.  I really started to understand it better, and realized how lost I had been regarding certain parts of the material.

So finals came and went.  I’m guessing test scores are posted on the internet nowadays, but back then there was an automated phone line you called to get your grade.  Turns out that I blew the final out of the water (even getting some bonus points), which turned my grade into a B+!!  I couldn’t believe it!
So I wasn’t held up.  I went on to take Electronics II in January, and passed that, too (though my grade wasn’t quite as high).
My wish for you is that you never give up, no matter how hopeless a situation looks.  You never know what you can pull off.

Grab your tissues for Casey’s first installment…

I was very young, like about 3 or 4 years old, my family would visit my Grammy and Grandpa Gilman almost every Saturday morning after breakfast.  They only lived a few miles away, so we were very close to them.
Every Saturday on the drive over, I can remember asking my parents if I could stay at Grammy and Grandpas’ house for the day, even after my parents and my sister went home.  My parents would tell me that it was rude to invite myself over for the day (which is true, I just didn’t see it that way when I was four).
Nonetheless, many times I’d end up staying at their house, even after the rest of my family left.  My grandparents loved their grandkids, and I think they had as much fun as I did when I was at their house.  My Grammy Gilman and I would take long walks, both in the neighborhood, and in the huge apple orchard behind their house.
They had a lot of toys at their house, which I believe were mainly left over from their four kids and several other grandchildren that had outgrown them.  My Dad is the youngest of their four boys, which made my sister and I the “babies” of the grandchildren.  Not all of the toys were hand-me-downs, however, as Gram’s favorite place to shop in any store was the toy aisle.
Besides the walks and the toys, we’d play games and listen to her records.  Grandpa Gilman would bring out a toy Ukele and sing goofy songs to both me (and my sister, who also spent a good amount of time with Grammy and Grandpa).  They had two swings hanging from a gigantic tree. I don’t recall what type of tree it was, but it always provided lots of shade in the summer.  It was always fun at their house.
The reason I seem to have more memories of my Grandmother is mainly due to my Grandfather dying of cancer when I was 9.  69 seems old when you’re a kid, but it’s really too early to go.  After his passing, my Grammy Gilman stayed in their house (which he built), and we remained close over the years.
Naturally, time always passes, and Gram got older and couldn’t get around quite as good.  The apple orchard became a housing development.  The big tree died and had to be cut down.  I also got older, which meant I got busier than I was when I was four.  Still, I continued to visit Gram (as did the rest of my family), and even spent the night many times.
I can’t say this is true of all of the grandchildren.  I can’t speak with certainty regarding their lives, but I saw a lot more of them coming by to visit and coming to family gatherings when I was little, than when I was a teenager or an adult.  My Mom told me once that my sister and I were the only grandkids that had anything to do with her.
When I was around 20, Gram had a sudden heart attack.  It was very close, but she pulled through.  A year or two later, she had some major internal bleeding and again had to be rushed to the hospital.  But again, she made it.  When I was 26, she had a stroke.  But Gram was TOUGH, and made a very good recovery for her age (by now she was in her mid-80’s).
Through all of these near death experiences, my parents did their best to shelter us from the situation.  But their faces, and their tone told the real story.  The truly thought she was a goner all three times (and have admitted that since).
Each time, I hated the thought of Gram leaving us.  She was the relative I was closest to outside of my immediate family, and always had been.
After her recovery, she really couldn’t get around.  Some people would have sent her to a nursing home, but certain family members pulled together, and created a support system for her to keep her as healthy and safe as possible while still living at her home of over 50 years.
During this time, I made sure to visit her whenever I could.  We always loved playing cards together, and we had many afternoons of playing Rummy.  Another thing we had in common was our love of sweets, so I bought her a set of sundae dishes and would make us ice cream sundaes (which prompted her to refer to me as the “Soda Jerk”).
Gram made it at her house for a little more than two years.  Finally, her health failed to the point that she needed constant care.  In April of 2007, she moved into a nursing home, where her health continued to decline.  On February 5th, 2009, she passed away.
I remember at her funeral, Jenn and I sat beside my cousin Peter (the oldest son of Gram’s oldest son) and his wife.  We hadn’t spoken in years, so we chatted for a couple of minutes.  At one point he mentioned very briefly  (while looking down at the floor, slightly ashamed) that he probably hadn’t seen her as often as he should have.  I realized that while I was sad, that I didn’t have any such regrets.
My wish for you is to appreciate your loved ones, and to make the most out of the limited time you have with them.

Hi Everyone! Please welcome back to the blog, my very own Mom, with her first story she wants to share with her future Grandchildren! Give her a warm welcome!

Many of my childhood memories include all the running around town I did on my own. I grew 0up in the 60’s in a small town where almost everyone did really know each other. If I were to guess I would say that at least 70% of the citizenry knew each other. More importantly they knew their neighborhoods, the kids, which kid belong to who and where they lived. I will always treasure the town I where I grew up and the atmosphere at the time. I fear those easy days are long gone from our society.

We moved several times when I was a kid before my parents were able to buy a house. Each one of the apartments or houses we lived in created more friends and opportunities to be introduced to new things. The apartment on West Main Street is where I saved my paper route money with my brother Mike to buy a piano. We bought that piano for $25 from a neighbor. I took lessons downtown at the local music shop. They also had sheet music. I really loved playing the piano and learning the songs of the day. My piano teacher did not appreciate the current music which included many of the British rock stars including the Beatles. She would not teach me how to play those songs. I taught myself. I was lucky that all the Beatles music was written in the key
of C which came easy to me. I also loved learning the music from movies. My father played the guitar by ear. He would jump in and accompany me.

We also met a family who moved from Florida. The kids had never seen snow and I remember how weird we thought that was. We taught them the ways of winter, especially sliding on a hill right outside our apartment. We really iced up that hill so we could go as fast as possible. Looking back now and thinking about the ice we managed to create I wonder now why we were never injured. Kids are obviously more flexible than adults.

The house on Orchard Street was where I met my best friend Nancy. It was where we lived the year that Santa left us a big beautiful toboggan only to have a green
Christmas day. No worries – we used it to the fullest over the years. We had some great hills in the area for sledding and tobogganing.

There was a curfew at 9:00 PM and all kids had to be off the streets and hopefully home by then. The city’s fire alarm sounded and you could hear it across the town. I laugh when I think of all the backyards that accommodated our run home around curfew time. Fortunately for us there were no fences around backyards at that time. If we were too late to where we were supposed to be the phones would start ringing. It paid to be on time.

My wish for you is to experience the friendship offered by neighbors.

It would be hard for me to guess how many car rides I took with my seat all the way down, and the sunroof open.

I would make pictures out of clouds and tell elaborate stories.

My Mom and I would turn the music up – really loud – and sing together at the top of our lungs.

It was the reason there was always a push-and-shove fight to see who got the front seat between my brother and I.

I remember the car my parents had for so many years, vividly. A blue stanza with spaghetti sauce stains from my brother and chocolate milk shake stains from me. The seats were worn and faded from years of road trips up the windy roads of Vermont. A layer of dust on the outside from traveling dirt roads to Groton and to our camp.

Our, rather large, collection of tapes strewn throughout the car and re-organized every so often into a tape organizer. The music was variety – from Rod Stewart to the Moody Blues to the Eagles, and all of the Billboard Top Hits.

When I think about summer, I think about traveling in that blue stanza, windows down, sunroof open, hair whipping in the wind, making cloud pictures, singing, laughing, and solving the problems of the world – or at least the problems in our world.

My future child/ren – I wish for you to have memories filled with the pure joy of the open road, and an open sunroof.

“Confronting Homelessness: Poverty, Politics, and the Failure of Social Policy” by David Wagner with Jennifer Barton-Gilman

I have just finished a very informative book, something that is very much outside the realm of my usual superhero comic books. Homelessness is a problem that we’re all aware of (although I’m sure our awareness varies from person to person).  This book really spells out exactly what the “homeless problem” is.

The main approach taken by the authors centers around a timeline, dating as far back as Medieval  Europe (homelessness is apparently an old problem).  The central focus of the book is the “new” homeless problem of the 1980’s, so the timeline gets a lot more detailed from 1979 to the early 1990s, and then continues on to the present day (the book was first released last July, so it’s pretty up to date).

But the trip through history, while very informative and interesting, is only the structure around which the rest of the writing is built.  Wagner and Barton-Gilman delve into the problem far beyond a mere explanation of historical facts (it should be noted that all of the facts are referenced in the form of end-of-chapter notes and a bibliography).  They also get into a lot of the “why” and “how” the problem of the 1980’s came about (as well as certain other periods, such as The Great Depression among others).

The “why”’s and “how”’s involve a lot of factors, many of which I wouldn’t have known about had I not read this book.  One of the more obvious reasons why we have so many homeless people is simply because we live in a country where the rich tend to get richer and the poor tend to get poorer.   The factors that I wouldn’t have thought of include deinstitutionalization, which put a lot of mentally ill people out on the streets without a place to live and without the ability to earn a living, as well the fact that many small, one room, apartments were demolished in the 1970s, as landlords and property managers could get a lot more money from renters by replacing small cheap apartments with more expensive and luxurious ones.

And how did this become such a “new” problem in the 1980’s?  The authors get into many contributors, one of the biggest ones being politics, and a the “construction” of the problem by Democrats to be used as a weapon against the Reagan administration, who was doing a lot budget cutting in the early 1980’s.

Beyond the informative discussions of the problem and its origins, there is also a lot of space devoted to the solutions, or at least the attempted solutions.  A lot of it boils down to the creation of soup kitchens and homeless shelters, which apparently many people thought would eventually end homelessness thirty years ago.  It’s probably obvious to most that it didn’t work, and the authors explain exactly why that is.

One thing that this book does not present is a hard and fast solution.  However, if one were to set out to end homeless, this book should be their bible.  Besides getting down to the facts of what the problem is and the many reasons why it has come about, there is a detailed explanation of what DIDN’T work, and what obstacles one would have to overcome to even think about curing this problem (our own government being a huge obstacle, as well as people who aren’t homeless, many of which have negative opinions of the homeless and helping them).

What I’ve talked about here just barely scratches the surface of what you’ll find in these pages.  There is a lot of information on public views, how they’ve changed over the years, advocacy groups and their approaches to solving the problem, political agendas past and present, and much more.  This book really opened my eyes to what an obstacle our own economics and government can be, and how easily the public can be bent by certain politicians, the media, and advocates.

One last thing that I found to be quite interesting, is a discussion towards the end of the book regarding one approach by society to the treatment of  homelessness as a social problem and not an economical problem.  The reality is, that many have approached helping the homeless the same way as the Civil Right’s or Women’s movements.  However, homeless people aren’t simply people who are born homeless (typically), the way people are born with different genders or skin colors.  They don’t necessarily need more rights, they need to not have to live on the streets or in shelters.  This “social problem” approach is only one approach of many, but I thought it was quite interesting.

David Wagner has written several books in the past (I haven’t read any of them, but I sound smarter if I mention them), but this time he took on a co-author, Jennifer Barton-Gilman who is an independent scholar.  I had the pleasure of having both authors attend my wedding, Wagner as a guest and Barton-Gilman as the bride, and I enjoyed the experience very much.

If you’re at all interested in the problem of homelessness (particularly its spike in popularity in the 1980’s), then this book is for you.  Even if you haven’t ever thought much about it, I recommend giving it a read, because it will more than likely open your eyes and give you some new insight to homelessness and parts of our society in general.  Those of you who are not savvy in the field of social work or social sciences need not fear; I have never taken a class given by a social work professor in my life and I didn’t find it hard to read at all.  Except for Chapter Two.  There were several terms in that chapter that I needed some explanation of from my wife.  I also learned cool new words like “recalcitrant”!

This book can be purchased directly from the publisher at:

https://www.rienner.com/title/Confronting_Homelessness_Poverty_Politics_and_the_Failure_of_Social_Policy

Overall, I give this book 4 and a half out of 5 stars.  It loses half a point for not mentioning “Man In The Mirror” as an effect of homelessness on our pop culture.  “We Are The World” is mentioned, but “Man In The Mirror” is a better song.  Have a great weekend, everyone, and happy reading!