cc: file, Grandma Hafen via Tony Hafen, Pauline Nelson via mail, Sara and Des Penny, Claude and Katherine Warner, Lloyd and Luana Warner. and Diane Cluff.
"In Junior High School I read all 23 Tarzan books. My English Teacher, whose name I can not remember, wanted us to read a book each month, and he would give extra credit for reading a second book. In addition, he gave extra credit for drawing a picture summarizing what the book is about. I read a book, and I read an extra credit book, even if they were Tarzan novels. And I drew the pictures. I remember Melissa Thorley, now a violinist for the Utah Symphony, being so upset that I read these `easy books,' drew the pictures, and got all of this extra credit.
Being the oldest son of the oldest son (Howard) of the oldest son (Roice Bengt) of the oldest son (Bengt, Jr.) of the second oldest son (Bengt) and the son of the oldest child (Pauline) of the oldest son (Paul Hafen) of the third oldest son (Adolf Hafen), I have always connected with Edgar Rice Bourroughs fictional character. Tarzan an oldest son with two `mothers,' was also an over achiever, trying to meet imagined expectations from some ethereal blue sky in his mind. Edgar Rice Burroughs captured my imagination at many levels with the words he wrote. I'm sure this is part of the reason I have found myself tearing my clothes going through thorny forrests in China and ending up in a military officer's back yard (.../9727), or crossing the Mississippi size river between Mauratania and Senegal in West Africa in a one person wide dugout canoe with my colleague Rod Avainius from Mobil Oil.
As I read this week's Time magazine articles about George Bush, about his struggles for a personal identity as an oldest son of an overachiever, my mind jumped to Roice, Heather, Melanie (the oldest daughter), and, since I was planning on seeing the new Walt Disney animated movie, to Tarzan. The overprint of birth order on our lives is an interesting phenomenon, and yet it is certainly not deterministic. I was very impressed with what was written about George W. Bush in Time Magazine. Not that he has made great achievements, just that he has become more of his own person. And this is what I remember about Tarzan. In the fictional idealization of man's struggle for improvement, Tarzan learned from everything around him. I still recall with wonder reading about him sitting in a tree watching natives go by underneath him, and not moving a muscle. To bring the point home, Edgar Rice Burroughs described in detail a fly landing on his eyebrow and walking across his eye, and Tarzen not blinking. Since we had a lot of flys at Nelson Meat Packing Plant, I was well acquainted with swatting flys, and I knew I could never have this much self control. And yet I'm sure these childhood images have colored my perceptions of what is possible to accomplish and how much self control we all should have. And I do not think this is good or bad. It just is. And that is one of the reasons to write these Thoughtlets, to share insights which can hopefully be of benefit to each of you at some time.
This week was spent with the Tiger Team I mentioned last Sunday. We will have formal presentations to the gorillas in the middle of July, finalize a business plan in August, and hopefully fund this venture for about $50 million sometime around October 1st. It is not appropriate to go into detail yet, and when it is I think you will each be impressed with how it came together (if it does). We had lunches and a nice closing dinner at Carmello's (which Sara tells me one of her friend's Dad's runs). In some small sense I felt like Tarzan this week, as I coordinated and negotiated and tried to keep the Tiger Team safari on course. It really did turn out pretty good, and I will write more about it another time. We finished up this phase on Thursday, and I actually made it home at a reasonable hour.
Friday was catch-up for spending most of two weeks out of the office. It is not a good time in the development of Continuum to be off doing other stuff, and I hope it turns out I made the right choices. There is definitly a risk associated with the stuff I do. I remember talking to Uncle Des and Aunt Sara when I went to pick up Andrea, Audrey, Rachel, and Matt about how my kids seem to be willing to take risk. So when I sit back and look at some of my entrepreneural activities, and then realistically evaluate the risk, I must admit I taught risk taking behavior. Maybe it is because I read about this fictional Tarzan as a kid, saw that he always made it through the very worst scrapes and survived, and assumed the same will happen for me. Even if as penance for wrecking a beautiful cashmire Lexus I am driving a $20 per day red Ford Geo (9924.html).
Friday evening Audrey dropped off Andrea at work, and we drove to Camp Liahona to see Rachel perform in the Liahona night. Everyone we talked to knew Rachel, she made a lot of friends, had a lot of fun, and wanted to get out of the heat. She had spiked her hair with little pony tails, and she was a warrior. Rachel reminded me of my imagination of the Amazon women in either the Tarzan books or the movies that came later. I remember going to color Tarzan movies with my Dad, and how much I enjoyed them. Sort of like Paul's description of growing us as one of the Jones boys in the Indiana Jones movies. Anyway, Rachel's program was wonderful, my heart absolutely melted when she stood up to bear her testimony and said `Hi Mom and Dad, thanks for coming.' Life is good, even though we didn't get back to the house until after 1:00 AM Saturday.
Yesterday started with Ken Turner stopping by, going for a combination run and walk around the block with Andrea, sorting out the books so Paul's book cases can be loaded by Alma while Rob and I are at Philmont, and going to see the new Tarzen movie. My mind thinks spatially. I absolutely love the way the animators used the 3-D Silicon Graphics models to allow free form flight through 3-D space. I want to get the models of the trees Tarzan flew through and put them in our immersive environment at work. Because of a mixup with tickets Andrea and I ended up going to the movie an hour later than Audrey, Sara, Rachel, Matt, and his friend Patrick. Rob saw the movie an hour before that. Melanie, Bridget, Heather, Nate, Ben, Sara, and Roice, I encourage each of you to go see the movie Tarzan. As you sit there, think about who your personal role models are, and what you are doing to follow their example and to find the happiness they found, which justifies their being your role model.
Rob and I are going to Philmont on Wednesday morning and so we will not be at Clayton's reception this next weekend. Sorry we will miss Ben and Sara and Roice, when you are in town this weekend. Give Clayton a hug for me and tell him that ever since he and Roice, A.J., and Tyler made such fun of us old guys at Philmont (running to the next camp first thing each morning and doing tens of pullups and hundreds of pushups with back packs on), that he became my model of a 90's Tarzan. Roice, do you remember when I took the four of you to a McDonald's with a delegation I was hosting from China? For those not there, the woman who was leading the delegation turned to me in a very embarassed way and said `Mr. Nelson, which of those boys is your son? I can not tell them apart. They all look the same to me.' I guess you were/are all Tarzan.
Have a great two weeks!"