I'm sitting in a hotel room in Tok, Alaska right now, with enough time to kill to actually blog a bit about the past 20 years.
You see, I work in Alaska, traveling to rural and remote villages across the state, consulting with teachers of students with severe disabilities, trying to help them improve their educational programs in small, tiny, isolated places. I travel by plane, boat, and sometimes snow machine to villages such as Stebbins, St. Michael, Tok, Shaktoolik and Ketchikan. This trip is a relatively nice one, with hotel and restaurant and all.
But how did I get here? I'm glad you asked.
I went straight on to undergrad at UCLA in 1987. I chose psychology as a major because my other choice didn't seem to offer me anything in the way of a future (English Major). I spent four years (ok, ok, four years and a desperate summer) studying sex, drugs and rock and roll, not necessarily in that order. I worked at various psychiatric hospitals as a nurse's aid and at UCLA in the Treehouse food court thingy. I played a ton of bad rock and roll, both on the guitar and on the bass. I made some great friends, and fell out of touch with the couple I had made in high school.
After college, I played in some bands around the LA and Hollywood areas, moved around the greater LA area, and generally worked in psych hospitals. I realized that my BA in psych only counted towards working as a nurse's aid some more. I watched the psych-ward teachers come in later than me, leave earlier than me, and make more money than I did. I went to CSUN to start a teaching credential. It was at this point I realized that the damn English major would have been more helpful. Hindsight and all.
I did come out of the psych hospital saga with something worth keeping, though: my lovely wife, Summer, who I began dating in 1992 and am married to even now, 15 years later. More on her and the kids later (this is called foreshadowing).
I went to work as a long-term substitute teacher at a locked school for kids with the label of Severely Emotionally Disturbed (SED) for about two and a half years. About a year into the credential studies, I was offered a stipend for a Masters' degree in moderate/severe disabilities. With the free money, I had to take the offer. I soon found out that I loved helping kids with significant disabilities learn what they needed to in the same "regular" classrooms that they would be in if they hadn't had a disability. I became a devout Inclusionist, and worked in Simi, Burbank, and finally as an inclusion specialist in LAUSD until 1999.
I also played with a band comprised of Bob Vassegh and Bill Horbury, both class of 87-ers. We called ourselves schwa (look it up!) and played all original music around the LA area. We rehearsed in the same studio in Santa Monica that Weezer did (yeah, Rivers is cool). I still hear from Bill on occasion (just did his company website for him), but haven't heard from Bob since he left for Boston several years ago.
I got married in 1996 and spent the last almost 4 years of my time in California as a teacher in LA, Burbank, Simi, and again in LA. My wife is a trained opera singer with a Master's degree in voice, which she earned at CSUN, and a recent Master's in Social Work, which she earned in Alaska a couple of years ago.
At the end of 1999, I heard about a job in the Alaskan wilderness. Based in Anchorage, people who worked there would have to travel by tiny plane, boat and snowmachine. I said, sign me up. My wife said, huh, wha, where? But eventually she relented. I flew up in December 1999 to a house that we rented sight unseen. I arrived to find the floor in the kitchen rotted out from a big spill. I could see the basement from near the refrigerator. My wife and her parents were coming up in a week.
I rented a different house; one that had all it's floors intact but was attached to a beauty salon. Sunday mornings were the best when the house filled with the smell of perm solution and the sound of hairdryers. Soon after moving up, we found out that Summer was pregnant with our "just-about-to-move-sleep-on-the-blow-up-mattress-on-the-floor" conceived child. We bought our first house just in time to welcome Hunter Elisabeth home. That was 7 years ago, and we had another child, Spencer David, who just turned 5.Which brings me to sitting in Tok, Alaska (Google map it, I dare you).
Currently, my job is half traveling consultant, half distance education coordinator and resident tech-geek at the Special Education Service Agency in Anchorage (www.sesa.org). I play music with a band in and around the Anchorage area (mostly original music, with some kick-ass covers thrown in -- including Weezer, hahhah). I also run a web-design business out of my house, and am working on a novel, which can be seen on my blog at www.roblef.com.
I'm loving my family, enjoying my life, and keeping busy. I've really dug reading the blog. It's amazing how everyone seems to have similar themes of life, career, love, etc. It's beautiful reading. Even Anthony, the guy I mostly remember as an amazing artist who drew Garfield like no other, has little pearls of wisdom and life-lessonry tossed in among the one liners and genuinely funny insights. I'm honored to have been a part of such a cool group of people way back in the days. So, yeah, it's a long blog entry, but I thought maybe it would be ok, since I won't be able to join you all at the reunion. Please, if you remember me and think fond thoughts, contact me at roblef AT gmail DOT com. I'd love to hear from you. Erin and I already have re-connected a bit because of the chamiblog and Facebook, so you could be next!
Thanks again, and hope to talk to you all soon!
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