Question #23

[fbhjr]

This is in answer to the frozendoll meme I started earlier.

#23) three achievements your proud of
I’m proud of my marriage with my wife. I’m not taking sole credit for it either. But, I don’t think anyone would deny I’ve done my share for it.
I have found someone who I truly love and with whom I want to spend my time.
That is very much an achievement of which I am proud.

I am quite proud that some of my designs at work at being patented. I’ve been an engineer for more than 25 years now and have never achieved getting a patent. Over the years I’ve had several ideas that I thought were worth it and I had been told by others were worth it. But, the companies for which I worked did not want to spend the money, and since I designed the things in question for them, it was their decision.
So, I’m very happy that the place I worked now has been willing to spend the money. And, so far my name is on more than 6 different patents. Some as the chief inventor, some as a co-inventor. That’s the advantage of being at the start of the project, my hand is in everything.

The third on is a bit harder to define.
The closest I can say is that I’m where I am living the life I live.
When I was young, I was considered stupid. I was in remedial classes. Most teachers clearly did not think highly of me. My seventh grade guidance counselor told my parents “Frank doesn’t have the brains to be a garbage collector” after I asked to be put in a higher math class.

I had figured it out in 4th grade. They were calling me stupid and I didn’t like it.
So, just before I turned 9 years old I came up with a plan to change it.
Four decades later I am still following that plan.
As I’ve discussed before my plan was not one to be normal. But, to pass close enough to be let past the guards of the special needs program and into the rest of the world.
And, I can’t deny I made it.
I do still fear that some day the guards will catch me and I’ll be sent back.
But, 40 year after that day sitting on the playground thinking about how to change things I’m sitting in my office as head of a design group for giant robot freezers.
Those guards will have to work really hard to get me now.

There have been several things in movies that have really struck a chord with me in this endeavor.
The first came from the second Six Million Dollar Man movie, before it became a regular TV show. (Wine, Women and War if you care.) For reasons I don’t remember, he is driving a speed boat at someone else. He pushes the throttle so far forward with his bionic hand that it snaps off.
That came out in 1973, only a year after I had started this plan.
I understood then that this was how it had to be done. You put it all into it and make sure you can’t stop. For years when I was tempted to give up I would mime putting my hand on that throttle and pushing it forward until it snapped. There are times I still do.

Then there is GATTACA.
In the swim contest between the two brothers. You win because you don’t save anything for the return trip.
That movie really struck me in a number of ways. Doesn’t seem like 15 years ago.

And, Spock from the new Star Trek movie when he declines to join the Vulcan Science Counsel.
I also do not well tolerate the way I am being called a disadvantage.
I’ve watched that section of the movie more than once just because it resonates with me so much.

So, I’m proud of who I am and of achieving that.