cc: file, Mom, Sara and Des, Lloyd and Luana Warner, Darrell and Nancy Krueger, Diane Cluff, Tony Hafen, Claude and Katherine Warner, Forest and Amy Warner, Ivan and Chell Warner, and Eric and Renee Miner
"This has certainly been a unique `spring break' for me. In the past we have taken the family to Colorado or done something as a group. Roice and Ben and Marti had Spring Break the week before. Melanie went to South Padre Island with four of her girl friends. Sara hung out with friends and went to Galveston Island. And Rob went to Austin and spent most of the week with me.
Rob, it was great to get to spend time with you and to get to know you better. I also really appreciated the help, even though I paid for it. For those who have a chance, be sure to get Rob to show you the results of his seismic interpretation of a portion of a large South Lake Maracaibo, Venezuela 3-D seismic survey. The map you made turned out really good, and although you were bored to death by cataloging paper well logs, this was an important contribution to our team's efforts. Then there was the typing you did. It is nice to know you like to type, and I'm sure others in the family will be pleased to know you will type term papers for them (for a fee).
I agree with Rob the highlights of the week were the times we spent together as family. We had dinner with Roice on Thursday night. The two of us went bowling afterwards (Roice had to go to class) and I got my highest ever score: 151. Rob bowled a 148 on the game after my high. The next day I was talking to the senior geophysicist at the Bureau of Economic Geology, Dr. Bob Hardage, and Rob jumped in with the conversation we had had the night before at the Black Eyed Pea, namely: `Do you believe time is the 4th dimension or the 5th dimension?' Bob was somewhat taken back. Then Rob said, `Einstein said time is the fifth dimension and we do not know what the fourth dimension is. I think it is gravity.' I tried to close of the conversation with, `Well Rob, it is kind of like Roice said last night, time could be the first dimension and the three spatial dimensions could be the second, third, and fourth dimensions. It is all a matter of definition.' Bob looked at Rob, looked at me, and said, `You guys could really kill a dinner conversation quick.'
We had dinner with Ben and Sarah in College Station on Friday. Rob was into being a University of Texas at Austin Longhorn fan, and we got to listen to a lot of Aggie jokes. Both Ben and Sarah took it in good humor, although I wondered if it was because I bought dinner. It was really fun to watch Rob explain his seismic interpretation to Sarah and Ben. When I called Ben about dinner on Friday morning, and he said he had not received any e-mail about us coming over. I said it was in last week's Thoughtlet. He responded, `Oh, I haven't read that yet.' I guess these Thoughtlets are not meeting some of my original objectives. However, Eric Warner sent a nice note saying how he enjoys reading them and even wrote `sometimes because of them I review my position.' Guess one can't expect much more than this, and hopefully in time this growing library of Thoughtlets will provide a whole new activity for someone who is searching to spend their Spring Break pondering.
Speaking of pondering, as I mentioned last week, Rob and I did spend Friday night and Saturday morning at my friend Anders Saustrap's Annual Spring Festival. Rob was up most of the night. Ander's said, `My, your son certainly likes to talk.' There was croquet, a remote controlled glider plane, skeet, campfires, bar-b-que Emu, some really good folk music, etc. Paul would have loved the tuba / guitar team that played for a couple of hours on Friday and on Saturday morning. In conversation with the artists and Anders, one gem that came up was the reason why so many of the early black musicians were blind or handicapped. Their handicap was the only thing allowing them to not spend all of their time working in the fields. Anders said that census records in the late 1800's early 1900's classified blind folks with lunatics. Times were certainly different than they are now, not that we are much easier on those with physical limitations.
I certainly remember my spring breaks in High School. This was the time to finish up the plowing, and I could probably plow 30-40 acres of Dad's 180 acre farm during that week. I remember spelling my girl friend's names out in the fields for the planes landing at Cedar City Airport with the plow before starting on a regular pattern across the field. I don't recall resenting the work. In fact, I enjoyed driving the tractor and singing at the top of my lungs, making up songs over the sound of the tractor groaning and struggling to churn the dirt.
Related to finishing a plowing pattern, there was an interesting couple of articles in today's Houston Chronicle about `Workaholics.' As I think about the patterns which were set in my life during those early Spring Breaks I recognize the truths in the newspaper article: `... When a workaholic's kids reach adulthood, their emotional framework often collapses like so many matchsticks. ... (They) often end up in therapy with failing marriages, depression or a sense of anger they can't identify. At the heart of their trouble ... was a well-meaning but absent parent who unconsciously taught them that you are judged by what you do, not who you are.' On January 8th of 1994 I wrote the following chorus to a song titled `Insecurity:'
According to the paper, in his book `Work Addiction,' Dr. Bryan Robinson recommends workaholics spend regular, intimate, quality time with their children, accepting them for who they are, and letting them make mistakes. I still hope these Thoughtlets count something for time, but I am going to attempt and do more things like spending the week with Rob in Austin over Spring Break. Thanks again Rob."