Purpose

I guess the reason I am writing all of these stories down ... the reason I am trying to recollect everything that has happened in my life, is because grandma isn't around anymore.

Grandma Morris was the reason I know who I am -- who my family is.

Helen Morris recorded the Morris family history through scrapbooks. Every time we visited her (my family) in Waveland, Mississippi, I looked forward to an evening where everyone would pull out a scrapbook and take in almost 100 years of history. Fourteen volumes of Black history. Our family history.

She would tell stories about my dad's cousins, and who his childhood friends were; why she was dressed to the nines in one photo and smiling ear to ear in another.

I miss her.

She passed away several years ago when I was still in college.

I remember the last time I saw her. I remember talking to my dad's uncle Andrew.

I remember thinking, "I am so blessed to have such a strong and beautiful family."

It is those memories of family gatherings that make me feel a responsibility to stay strong ... to accomplish great things ... to be a rock for my (God willing) future children.

Grandma is gone, but the recording of our family history has not passed with her.

My fingers are the new orator. My blog, the family griot.

I invite you to share in my life's achievements. My failures. My moments of joy, and times of sadness.

A Correction to My Last Post ...

... I now have a del.icio.us account.

My username is 'morrisryanc'. Now I just need some people to give me some tags.

Random Technology Observations

I think I am obsessed with my laptop -- and everything that it can can't do.

I just spent four hours screwing around with an OS shell called Litestep. I still haven't figured out how to get the fricken thing to allow me to use my shortcut keys.

Two confessions:

1. I am addicted to RSS feeds.
2. I don't have a del.icio.us account.

My Dad Is the Reason I Love the Internet

“No, no. You go like this,” my dad said as he demonstrated how to properly close a telescoping radio antenna.

“You start at the bottom and gently pull straight down. Once the sleeve is all the way down, you move up to the next section of the antenna and do the same thing … and so on and so forth.”

Everything I have learned about electronics and my curiosity for everything technological I credit to my dad.

Before the Internet, cell phones and digital surround sound, my dad was “early adopting” and “pioneering” at as quick of a rate as his generation’s scientists could muster.

You see, my dad was a ham. No, not a goofy prankster, but rather an amateur radio operator, or “ham” as operators are still known today.

He was just 13-years old when he earned his novice amateur radio license. It wasn’t long before he worked his way up the ranks to be able to talk to entirely different countries through the analog form of communication.

I assume his passion for amateur radio growing up was much like my passion for computers and gadgets.

As a military family, we moved to several different houses. Whenever it came time to look at a house to move into, one of my dad’s concerns was always “Where will the amateur radio antenna be mounted in this place?”

In Sacramento, CA my dad had what was called a Yagi antenna. It was a huge monstrosity of a thing that dwarfed our modest three bedroom – ahem, actually four bedroom – home (dad took one of the bedrooms as his own radio shack and made my two sisters share a room – a decision that still to this day during family gatherings is not left to die by my adult sisters).

When we moved to Fairfax, VA he mounted a single pole antenna in-between several tall trees that were in the front of our house.

We moved three times in Fairfax.

In the second house – just two blocks down the street – he ran a long wire that made what is called a dipole antenna. Picture a piece of cable split into a “Y” shape and then mounted up in the canopy of a forest; At least it was hidden this time.

In the third Fairfax home, (this time my parents purchased the house since they got tired of the Air Force telling them it would only be another 18 months till we PCS’d somewhere new) dad decided to mount a pole to the garage and attach a long piece of cable to it. I think that cable must have stretched 70 or 80 feet into the forest behind our house. Like the home before, this was a dipole antenna.

In the final Fairfax home (not really a home per se, but more of a temporary place for my parents to lay their head down while their dream home was built three hours away) or should I say, apartment, there were no antennas to speak of. I know my mom was relieved by this.

What does all of this talk about antennas have to do with me? It simply points out that the apple doesn’t fall far from the tree.

As I said before, I believe I get all of my technology interests from my father. As a perfect example, I currently run four Blogs and three Web sites. Did I mention I have switched cell phone carriers every year for the last three years (and sometimes twice in a year), just because one of the carriers had a cooler phone or better data rate plan?

As I said, the apple doesn’t fall that far from the tree.

Sacramento: My First Set of Stitches

I would be lying if I said I remembered the accident in its entirety. When I was around four years old, I obtained my first set of stitches from an accident, which involved a glass of orange juice, a vacuum and friendly competition.

I wonder if I do not really remember the event at all -- perhaps after being told the story so many times by my parents, I created my own "memory" of the event; like a schema of sorts.

My family and I were stationed in Sacramento, California. It was around 1980 or 1981 when the accident happened; because I think, I was either three or four years old.

I was at my best friend Matthew Grove's house for the afternoon. My mother was out running errands and she asked Matthew's mom to look after me for a few hours. I probably would have spent time over at the Grove's house anyways as Matthew and his brother Jeremy and I spent most of our free time together -- which when you are not in kindergarten yet is a LOT of time.

The story goes like this: Matt and I were in his family room and his mom shouted from the adjacent kitchen for Matthew to retrieve the dirty glass his father had left on the coffee table the previous night.

In the spirit of friendly competition, one of us challenged each other to race to the glass. Yeah, I know, not that smart.

We tore across the family room rug and before you know it, I tripped over a vacuum cord and put the back of my head squarely into the juice glass and wood coffee table.

Smash!

Legend has it that because my head is rumored to be plated in iron, the oak coffee table cracked from the blow it took from my noggin.

Luckily, Mrs. Grove had been a nurse, so she knew exactly what to do to deal with the bleeding from my head.

I do not remember going to the hospital, who took me (I think it was my mother, but not sure), or if I passed out or not.

I do however remember getting the stitches out. We always went to McClellan Air Force Base for my family's healthcare needs, and the removal of stitches was no exception. I remember being nervous and very concerned that removing the stitches would hurt.

My mother took me to see the doctor and from what I can remember, I did not cry. I remember the blue sterile paper that the doctor's implements were laid on, and him saying that I did just fine. I don't remember his face though; just his conclusion that I did a "good job" and am a "very brave boy."

If you look at the center of the back of my head, you can see a perfectly round scar above a vertical scar. Sometimes when people ask me how I got the scars, I pull their leg and say it was from a time when five muggers with knives jumped me. "I was the lucky one," I'd tell them ...

Uruguay: Getting There

I was 12 years old when I moved to Uruguay. My dad was a colonel in the Air Force at the time and to this day, I think he still believes the Uruguay tour was the best assignment he ever had.

When I was around 8 years old, my dad left my mom, sisters and I to head to the Presidio of Monterey, California for several months to master the Spanish language. The Presidio of Monterey is the ‘Home of the Defense Language Institute Foreign Language Center’. It is renowned as the United States' best foreign language school.

Dad always had a fascination with all things "Latino." A quick look through his vinyl collection and you could tell that his curiosity to learn about Latino culture wasn't just a phase. Some of his records are from his undergrad college days at the University of Utah as an ROTC student. I think my mom and he took dancing lessons when they were undergrads. A little tango, a little mambo, and some Polish polka -- that's a whole other story.

OK, so Uruguay. I remember my mom and I had to wake up early and be at the Dulles International Airport four hours before our flight to New York was supposed to take off. We were bringing our family dog, Buttons -- a mindless yet adorable Poodle Terrier -- so that meant we had to be at the airport and additional two more hours on top of the four required for international flights.

I don't remember much about what I did to bide my time while waiting to board the Pan Am 747 for six hours, but I do remember an incident involving my mother's purse, and consequently the first time I realized I was more mature than I knew.

As I walked down the Jetway with my mother, carry-on luggage in tow, I remember thinking, "So, at what time am I actually going to say goodbye to America? I mean, at what point do I fully accept that I won't be coming back to the U.S. for three years? Is it when the wheels of the plane are no longer touching the tarmac in New York? Is it when I first see the Atlantic Ocean 30,000 feet below?"

Such a question boggled my 12-year old mind.

It wasn't until we were all settled in our seats – co-pilot side of the Boeing 747 with me in the window seat-- that I saw a panicked look on my mother's face.

I remember we were looking out the window watching the baggage handlers load Buttons’ kennel into the belly of the craft.

"Oh, no! Oh my God!," my mother said.

"What? What's wrong?," I said.

"Where's my purse? Is it in my carry-on?" she said frantically as she tore through her bags.

"Mom, calm down!" I said. "See if the stewardess can do anything. Do you think you left it at the gate?"

"I don't know. I might have. Yes, maybe."

She was able to get a flight attendant's attention and inquire about her purse.

"It had everything in it; our passports, cash, credit cards, everything."

The attendant said she would see what info she could find out. Unfortunately, my mom wasn't able to run back to the gate to look for it as we were in the final stages of pre-flight check.

I think it wasn't until we were taxiing down the runway that the attendant leaned over to my mom and assured her it would be waiting for us at the gate in New York.

It wasn't until then that she completely calmed down and was able to enjoy the flight. We had a good chuckle about it too, and how her pre-teen son told her to, “Chill!” and get a grip.

“The situation could be a lot worse,” I reminded her.

She looked into my eyes and said, “You’re right, it could be.”