Update on my oldest, Kirby
Sandra Dodd
Today on facebook, Kirby posted this a facebook “a year ago today” that said “Started working at Kemtah, April 27, 2015."
____________
Apparently it's been a year. I'm a Tier2 now, the two guys who trained me to do anything both got let go shortly after my first round of training. So now I kind of run the show, with a new manager coming to join us in just under two weeks. (Who will need a ramp up period).
Times are crazy! When I first started it was a common thought of "Ugh, two more hours to go til end of shift" and now the thought is "Zomg only two more hours to get all this done? What CAN I get done in that time?”
___________
Except for a year working at Dion’s Pizza (most Albuquerque kids work there at some point), his jobs have involved games, then games and computers, and and now computers. He works on a contract providing "computer-desk” help for a large engineering firm (the one his dad worke for for so long, and has stock in).
Kirby left Texas, and his good job with Blizzard Entertainment, to be nearer his family. When he went to Texas, he thought it would be just a year or two, but it was nearly nine. A little over two years ago, Kirby helped his girlfriend regain custody of her daughter (from the grandmother)—very long stories behind that involving harsh fundamentalist Christianity and alcohol, which is unfair combination, to need to deal with both). Kirby found and paid for a lawyer, did a lot of driving and meetings, taking time off from work, to accomplish that change. The girl was four, then, nearly five. I flew out to Austin to help them for a couple of weeks when they suddenly and unexpectedly got physical custody and had fulltime jobs—my first one-way ticket anywhere.
Two years later, Devyn is seven and living in a house her mom and Kirby are buying, not far from our house. She calls Kirby “Kirby” to his face, but refers to him as “my dad.” He has been the most reliable, calm, attentive person in her entire life thusfar. It’s not an easy thing, to rescue people that way, but Kirby did it, and is doing it.
When the three of them first moved here from Texas, they stayed with us for what ended up being seven or eight months (they moved out gradually, as they worked on that house). I had recommended that they take a month or two to be tourists, so he could show Destiny and Devyn more of New Mexico, and they could relax a bit after their rough couple of years. But he wanted to find a good job, and within about a month, he and Destiny both had jobs at Kemtah.
Destiny has been promoted too, and will soon be working in a different location (at Sandia Laboratories, on the air base, closer to their house).
On weekends they do cool things together. Devyn goes to a cheerleading academy owned by Marty (my younger son)’s wife’s sister, so they get a family discount. Devyn doesn’t like the cheerleading, but takes a tumbling/gymnastics class that she DOES love. They take her to the children’s museum and to parks, and buy her art supplies and play games with her. Devyn’s life is hugely bigger, better, and safer.
Not all men will help someone else in that way.
Sometimes Kirby’s life is stressful, but he has ways to calm himself and to continue with hope and good intentions.
He makes more money than either my husband or I did at the age of 29 (even adjusting for inflation). He is buying a house, which we weren’t. He has already bought a car and finished paying for it (a 2008 Mazda 6 he got used a few years ago, and wanted to buy and pay for without our help, in order to establish credit—and to impress his dad).
I know that to many people, that story will be a glaring “did not go to college” story. But Kirby has worked for sixteen years of his life, diligently, responsibly. He’s not a whiner. People trust him with their keys, their money, their lives. There are people his age who are still in school, or recently out of school, with student loans greater than the price of the house he’s buying, who have no job, no car, no house. There are people his age who are irresponsible, dishonest slackers (or worse).
I always like to include a link.
This has a great story of fifteen-year-old Kirby (half of his lifetime ago) being sent, alone, to work a sales table at a Magic the Gathering tournament, and how he took care of the cash without a cash register or even a calculator (pre-smart-phones):
http://sandradodd.com/math/unerzogen
There are other stories there about how my children learned mathematics, too.
Sandra
Sam
Sent from my iPhone
On 27 Apr 2016, at 16:25, Sandra Dodd Sandra@... [AlwaysLearning] <[email protected]> wrote:
Kirby was born in 1986, so he’ll be 30 this summer. He’s getting married in October. Yesterday he sent me an account of the first time he and Destiny were together in a group outing, and he had decided he especially liked her. I can’t share that, because it’s going out with their wedding-invitation packet (a non-traditional home-made set of things). He sent me the first draft, to help him polish it. There were a few places where two sentences needed to be one, and vice versa. There was a place where phrasing was awkward. Artistically, though—the imagery and sweetness and humor—it’s great writing.
Today on facebook, Kirby posted this a facebook “a year ago today” that said “Started working at Kemtah, April 27, 2015."
____________
Apparently it's been a year. I'm a Tier2 now, the two guys who trained me to do anything both got let go shortly after my first round of training. So now I kind of run the show, with a new manager coming to join us in just under two weeks. (Who will need a ramp up period).
Times are crazy! When I first started it was a common thought of "Ugh, two more hours to go til end of shift" and now the thought is "Zomg only two more hours to get all this done? What CAN I get done in that time?”
___________
Except for a year working at Dion’s Pizza (most Albuquerque kids work there at some point), his jobs have involved games, then games and computers, and and now computers. He works on a contract providing "computer-desk” help for a large engineering firm (the one his dad worke for for so long, and has stock in).
Kirby left Texas, and his good job with Blizzard Entertainment, to be nearer his family. When he went to Texas, he thought it would be just a year or two, but it was nearly nine. A little over two years ago, Kirby helped his girlfriend regain custody of her daughter (from the grandmother)—very long stories behind that involving harsh fundamentalist Christianity and alcohol, which is unfair combination, to need to deal with both). Kirby found and paid for a lawyer, did a lot of driving and meetings, taking time off from work, to accomplish that change. The girl was four, then, nearly five. I flew out to Austin to help them for a couple of weeks when they suddenly and unexpectedly got physical custody and had fulltime jobs—my first one-way ticket anywhere.
Two years later, Devyn is seven and living in a house her mom and Kirby are buying, not far from our house. She calls Kirby “Kirby” to his face, but refers to him as “my dad.” He has been the most reliable, calm, attentive person in her entire life thusfar. It’s not an easy thing, to rescue people that way, but Kirby did it, and is doing it.
When the three of them first moved here from Texas, they stayed with us for what ended up being seven or eight months (they moved out gradually, as they worked on that house). I had recommended that they take a month or two to be tourists, so he could show Destiny and Devyn more of New Mexico, and they could relax a bit after their rough couple of years. But he wanted to find a good job, and within about a month, he and Destiny both had jobs at Kemtah.
Destiny has been promoted too, and will soon be working in a different location (at Sandia Laboratories, on the air base, closer to their house).
On weekends they do cool things together. Devyn goes to a cheerleading academy owned by Marty (my younger son)’s wife’s sister, so they get a family discount. Devyn doesn’t like the cheerleading, but takes a tumbling/gymnastics class that she DOES love. They take her to the children’s museum and to parks, and buy her art supplies and play games with her. Devyn’s life is hugely bigger, better, and safer.
Not all men will help someone else in that way.
Sometimes Kirby’s life is stressful, but he has ways to calm himself and to continue with hope and good intentions.
He makes more money than either my husband or I did at the age of 29 (even adjusting for inflation). He is buying a house, which we weren’t. He has already bought a car and finished paying for it (a 2008 Mazda 6 he got used a few years ago, and wanted to buy and pay for without our help, in order to establish credit—and to impress his dad).
I know that to many people, that story will be a glaring “did not go to college” story. But Kirby has worked for sixteen years of his life, diligently, responsibly. He’s not a whiner. People trust him with their keys, their money, their lives. There are people his age who are still in school, or recently out of school, with student loans greater than the price of the house he’s buying, who have no job, no car, no house. There are people his age who are irresponsible, dishonest slackers (or worse).
I always like to include a link.
This has a great story of fifteen-year-old Kirby (half of his lifetime ago) being sent, alone, to work a sales table at a Magic the Gathering tournament, and how he took care of the cash without a cash register or even a calculator (pre-smart-phones):
http://sandradodd.com/math/unerzogen
There are other stories there about how my children learned mathematics, too.
Sandra
Clare Kirkpatrick
Like Devyn, I too have a wonderful step-father. He saved my life by being so wonderful - steadfast, loving, giving. Kirby probably doesn't know how much of an important thing he's done and continues to do for Devyn. His obvious loyalty, sense of what is right and wrong, and belief in good is a huge testament to yours and Keith's parenting. I don't understand how anyone could value further education over that. Thank you for sharing his story, and please, on behalf of a step-daughter, thank him for willingly and lovingly taking on such an important role for little Devyn.
Clare
Sylvia Woodman
On Wed, Apr 27, 2016 at 6:19 PM, Clare Kirkpatrick claremkirkpatrick@... [AlwaysLearning] <[email protected]> wrote:Like Devyn, I too have a wonderful step-father. He saved my life by being so wonderful - steadfast, loving, giving. Kirby probably doesn't know how much of an important thing he's done and continues to do for Devyn. His obvious loyalty, sense of what is right and wrong, and belief in good is a huge testament to yours and Keith's parenting. I don't understand how anyone could value further education over that. Thank you for sharing his story, and please, on behalf of a step-daughter, thank him for willingly and lovingly taking on such an important role for little Devyn.
Clare