"There have been two times of significant change of direction in my life. The first one was in the fall of 1979 when I was so frustrated at Mobil and had and grabbed the opportunity to go to The Seismic Acoustics Laboratory to lay the groundwork for the creation of Landmark Graphics Corporation. The second is now, the spring and summer of 2005, some 25 or 26 years after the first major change in in the vector of my life. My goal in this thoughtlet is to put into words the feelings and thoughts and ideas and opportunities and challenges and fears and hopes tied to this second significant change of direction in my life. I doubt if a few words will do justice to the infinite complexity tied to significant change.
First a question. Why did I select the title `My Second Sixth Anniversary?' When I was flying back from Beijing the week before this Thoughtlet is all about, I watched the movie `Ocean's Twelve.' I recall really liking the movie `Ocean's Eleven' about robbing three casino's in Las Vegas (../0151.html). I also recall not liking the movie `Ocean's Twelve' (and, according to my word searches, this is shown by the fact I never even mentioned watching it in the Thoughtlets). I had just returned from an overseas trip when we went to see it, and I could not stay awake. The result was I did not follow the plot at all, and the whole thing seemed very weird. However, as I watched the same movie when flying from Beijing to San Francisco I was surprised to find an interesting series of plot lines and a movie that I did enjoy. One of the phrases in the movie that caught my attention was when George Clooney and Julia Roberts were celebrating their second third anniversary. After the movie I got thinking that my second sixth anniversary was coming up in one day less than two weeks, on May 15th. After watching the movie, my mind jumped back to the time of significant transition that occurred about the time of my first sixth wedding anniversary, which was September 5th in 1979, when living in Dallas. Then I got thinking about the options opening up for me in Houston as we approach my second sixth anniversary. Finally, when making notes about what happened the week of May 8th to May 15th, 2005, it seemed to make perfect sense to summarize the week with the words, my second sixth anniversary.
Let me start with some context from 1979. While I was on my mission in England from October 1970 to November 1972 I had several spiritual experiences which convinced me there needs to be a new way for people to live together. This was the beginning of what was incorporated on the 18th of May in 1990 as Walden 3-D, Inc. When I returned from my mission it was right to get married, pursue a career, and have children. These activities, along with fulfilling church callings became the priority. And the city planning became a hobby. Over the subsequent 33 years I have read quite a bit about city planning. I have had the unique opportunity to study the best and the worst of city planning in places all over the world. I have jumped at the opportunity to take tours of state-of-the-art buildings in Japan or London, to talk to people about what they like and what they don't like, and to think about what needs to be done different to improve our cities. I built a model in my mind of why what I was doing as a geophysicist is related directly to my passion for improving housing and quality-of-life.
The idea is simply that our cities are built on or in the earth, and geophysics provides a unique way to understand the earth so as to optimize what is built on or in it. So even though I was focused on a geophysical career, having children and giving you best start possible, and fulfilling church callings, these other plans have always been in the background. The first phase was the formation of Landmark Graphics Corporation (www.lgc.com) which was to provide tools to accurately and in great detail map the subsurface the city would be built on or in. My original idea was that Landmark would be the economic and demographic basis of forming the new city as a company town. However, the money people, whom I associate with Satan (see D&C 86:3), took over Landmark and it was no longer an option to use Landmark to do this kind of good for mankind. So as soon as Landmark went public, I started to implement the plans outside of Landmark, realizing that the technology could still be used, even if the company could not. We first formed Walden 3-D, Inc. (www.walden3d.com) as the general contractor for the new three-dimensional city. We formed Advanced Structures Incorporated (www.asidesign.com) as the designer and builder of the new city envelope and framework. We formed China Cattle Company, which my share was later sold back to Chuck Edwards, to provide protein to the new city. We formed HyperMedia Corporation (www.walden3d.com/hmc96) to provide an information infrastructure for the new city. We formed Dynamic Oil & Gas Corporation, which was later reformed as Dynamic Resources Corporation (www.walden3d.com/d), to provide energy to the new city and money to design and build it. We formed Walden Visualization Systems (www.walden3d.com/wvs), which was later purchased by Continuum Resources Corporation and then bankrupted, to create a 3-D visualization of the city prior to any work being done on the construction. We experimented with virtual seminars (www.walden3d.com/courses) so we could learn to optimally get the word out about the new types of cities. We supported Ken Turner (www.walden3d.com/hgol) and saw his type of art as a contributor to and molder of city culture. And the point of reiterating this list is to give context to the significant change in the vector of my life that occurred at my first sixth anniversary.
It was obvious to me I was a failure in meeting my life goals as I approached age 30 in the fall of 1979. I was working for a large international oil company (Mobil Oil), and had a reasonable salary, an opportunity to travel, and time to spend with my family and church work. However, I was never going to be rich enough to accomplish my life goals. And I was running into the bureaucracy barrier that I have never learned how to attack. The Lord would plant a great idea in my mind, I would take this idea to my bosses, and it was considered fantasy. No resources were available to pursue the idea, and everything possible was done to kill any progress on the idea. I was boxed in and knew that I needed to escape from the box. As part of my MBA studies at SMU (Southern Methodist University), I knew that the best place to be able to learn everything necessary to take a new idea and successfully implement it was at the interface of academic - industry research. I was actively looking for this place when I found Fred Hilterman and the Seismic Acoustics Laboratory. And I was able to sell him on my abilities to help his lab grow.
So the big change in the vector of my life that occurred at my first sixth anniversary anniversary is that I quit a relatively secure salaried career, took a significant cut in pay, moved myself, my wife, and 4 young children from Dallas to Houston at my own expense without having sold our house nor having a new house to move into, and reinvented myself. This reinvention allowed me to better attack my life mission. However, this attack was a glancing blow and bounced off of the target in several different directions as described above. Specifically there has not been personal financial independence and security. And as a result, the physical realization of prototyping a new way to build our cities has never progressed beyond the rough idea stage. I could expand on money and marriage and kids and how all of this stuff is related in my mind to the things I have mentioned, and I won't. The bottom line is that as we approached our first sixth anniversary, I sensed a significant change in the vector of my life. And as I look back over the last 26 years, there is no question but that discovery of the University of Houston Seismic Acoustics Lab and all that followed from accepting a position there was a significant change in my life and in in the lives of those I love. Changes for better and for worse, for richer and for poorer, and times of sickness and of good health. Changes.
As I said good-bye to Andrea at George Bush Intercontinental Airport in Houston, Texas on Sunday, the 8th of May, and made my way to catch a plane to Washington D.C. I sensed that the vector of my life is about to make another significant change. And the changes started with being a half hour late in arriving in Houston and three hours late leaving for Washington D.C. While waiting in the terminal I overheard a conversation making up the first two lines which I added to to create a possible stanza for Prime Words:
And with these thoughts in my mind I made it to Washington D.C. very late, found a cab, and was checked into my motel, The Best Western Pentagon, about 3:00 AM Monday morning.
I went to Washington D.C. to look for the new vector I sense
is there for me to find as I approach my second sixth anniversary.
The specific reason was to attend the IEOS (Integrated Earth
Observation System) Public Engagement Workshop sponsored by
IW-GEO (the Presidential Interagency Working Group on Earth
Observations). I had Nicholas at GDC print and bind a dozen
copies of a White Paper I wrote a few weeks back (see:
http://www.walden3d.com/whitepapers/IW-GEO_Indexing_Strategy.pdf).
In China, between reading The Book of Hopi, The Book of Mormon,
and entering genealogy (0518.html), I had put together a summary
of 10 government scale research projects that relate to the goals
of the IEOS Public Engagement Workshop, as shown to the right
and as expanded by clicking on the image. In Salt Lake Taylor
Wright and I had gone to a Kinko's and printed a 2 foot by 3
foot version of this poster, along with a dozen 8 1/2" x 11"
copies. In many ways I felt like I was going to the first
3-D Seismic Technologies Workshop in Houston, Texas in September
of 1979 where I first met Fred Hilterman and was able to obtain
a position at the University of Houston. And being a person
who notices patterns, I can not help but recognize the similarities
on many levels between my first sixth anniversary and my second
sixth anniversary.
I was up at 7:00 and called a cab to take me to the Ronald Reagan Building in downtown Washington D.C. to be early to the IEOS Public Engagement Workshop. The lectures were absolutely fascinating to me. The concept of integrating all available earth observation data and using this for bettering our world excite me. I see this effort as directly feeding the design and implementation of a new and better kind of housing for the world. For two days I was in my element, drinking as if from a fire hose. In the afternoons both days I participated in discussion groups (Monday on Energy and Tuesday on Data Management). I distributed copies of my white paper to key individuals I met. Mike Leavitt was the keynote speaker on Tuesday morning. I was hoping to talk to him, and he was controlled by handlers such that he came in, gave his presentation, and left, and there was no opportunity for discussion. His presentation was excellent. One of the major goals he described is to build a standard for communication across all areas of the medical community, like a common rail gauge became the basis of our modern transportation system a century and a half ago. All of my notes on the presentations are in my office at GDC, and so I won't bore anyone who reads this thoughtlet with the details. Depending on what happens in the future will determine whether I think it is appropriate to bring up all of those notes and share my thoughts about the presentations and workshop conversations. I stayed on Tuesday evening to go to the Pirksen Senate Office Building from 5:30 to 7:30 and listen to US Senator Ted Stevens from Alaska and US Representative Sherwood Boehlert from New Hartford talk about how important they think the IW-GEO is. Both Monday and Tuesday evening I walked about a mile to find a Pizza place or a 7-11 where I could buy some dinner.
Wednesday morning I did not set my alarm clock correctly, and didn't wake up until after my plane had left for Houston. Oh well! I went to the airport and there was another plane to Houston. Because I didn't get in until after lunch, I did not go to the office on Wednesday. I started to get caught up on mail and newspapers and e-mails and other stuff that happened at home since I left about a month earlier.
Thursday and Friday were very busy at work catching up after being gone for a month. On Thursday May 12th there was an interpretation group luncheon for everyone who has been working on TILESSM at Ninfa's on Post Oak. Thursday evening we went to the Taylor High School Choral Department concert `Put a Little Love in Your Heart.' Choir has been good for Matt, despite the New Orleans experience (0515.html). I particularly liked `Broken Vow' sung by Haley Griffin, and the Chorale's versions of `Somewhere,' and `Ain't No Mountain High Enough.' Matt was glad to have me home, and he seemed to be in pretty good spirits.
Saturday evening Andrea and I went to see `The Interpreter.' She really liked it. I was/am still in shock and pain from my brief conversation in Salt Lake City, and in many ways the movie was like touching a raw nerve. Oh well!
Sunday, May 15th, I captured thoughts for a possible stanza on scripture from Ellen Camps talk in Sacrament meeting:
So as I close this Thoughtlet, I expect I have raised more questions than given answers. At the beginning I stated a desire to put the feelings and thoughts and ideas and opportunities and challenges and fears and hopes tied to this second significant change of direction in my life into words. As I read back over what I have written, it is obvious easier to look back at my first sixth anniversary and see how the vector of my life has changed than to put into words how the vector of my life will change around my second sixth anniversary. Oh well! Time always tells."