Some of my interests are listening, my life as a born again Christian, the power of prayer, this web page, all kinds of books (including Lee Stobel's books, novels by Louis L'Amour {also see his memoir Education of a Wandering Man}, Robert B. Parker [Spenser stories], Lilian Jackson Braun [all her novel titles begin with "The Cat Who...."], and The Outlander Series by Diana Gabaldon, etc.), my family,  growing tomatoes in the garden, fly fishing, crossword puzzles (there's a book of them in every room of the house), going to Reno and Tahoe occasionally to see a show and have fun, musicals, classical and pop music as well as Gregorian Chants and sacred music, my church -- Christian Life Center of Merced -- AND ACKNOWLEDGING OTHERS AS TRULY UNIQUE.
This poem and quotes express attitudes I have.
Thanks, MizBee, for letting me borrow the poem.
Mirror hanging on the wall,
I really don't like you at all;
And the reason is because,
I ain't what I used to was.
But my heart reflects
What my mirror can't see;
That way deep down inside of me,
I'm just as young as I used to be!
--Jeanne Millare
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Beautiful young people are acts of nature,
but beautiful old people are works of art. |
"To me old age is always fifteen years older than I am."
- Bernard Baruch (1870-1965) |
| One advantage of old age: Your secrets are safe with your friends because they can't remember them either. |
| I plan on living forever. So far, so good. |
| At my age, getting lucky means being able to find my car in the parking lot. |
| You're getting old when you get the same sensation from a rocking chair that you once got from a roller coaster. |
| You don't stop laughing because you grow old; you grow old because you stopped laughing. |
| Wrinkles should merely indicate where smiles have been. - Mark Twain. |
| Statistics show that at the age of seventy, there are five women to every man. Isn't that the darndest time for a guy to get those odds? |
| Seen it all, done it all, can't remember most of it. |
EARLY DAYS IN ARKANSAS
  I was born in the small village of Hagarville, Arkansas in 1931. Hagarville is not too far from Russellville (on Highway 40) on the above map. My father was a hard working farmer, who believed that hard work solved any problem. My mother was a busy housewife who not only raised my father's four children by his first wife, but also three of her own. I had a German Shepherd dog named "Friend," and my mother would always know where I was by calling the dog, because he was always by my side.
 
When I was five, we lost the farm and began a life of moving often.  We first lived in Mount Vernon Washington, then Pawnee Oklahoma, and Antlers Oklahoma,where I attended Brantley Elementary School.
  During World War II, we moved to Long Beach, California, where my father worked in the shipyards and my sisters and cousin worked at Douglas Aircraft. I was in Boy Scouts, attended Hamilton Junior High School, and was a member of the Trinity Baptist Church. I also worked in a poultry house, beginning with 35 cents an hour and working up to 65.
 We moved from Long Beach after the war to Talequah, Oklahoma, where I played in the high school band, and where my parents owned a motel. I spent the first semester of my freshman year there, and I remember that the Algebra teacher was excellent. On Sunday afternoons after attending the First Baptist Church, some boys would gather at the high school athletic field and play touch football.
 We finally settled in Modesto,California in 1946, first living on Ruberto Avenue and then on Crowslanding Road.  I graduated from Modesto High School and Modesto Junior College. My father only finished the sixth grade in school, and my mother only finished the eighth grade, but my mother was determined that her children would have the education she missed, so my two sisters and I ended up with masters degrees, and I have always been thankful for my mother's vision of the value of education. Thanks mom!
 I get my name from my father, whose original name was Cleveland (or Sherman, there is a family difference of opinion.) However, he had a little sister with a speech impediment who pronounced it "Teman," and he asked his parents to change it. Later we found the name in the Old Testament of the Bible. It was the name of land in the Tigris Euphrates Valley (where Iraq is now), and was also the name of the tribe and its chieftain. |
MY EDUCATION
I graduated from Modesto High School, Modesto, California in 1949.  I received an AA from Modesto Junior College in 1951, a BA in English in 1953 and an MA in Rhetoric (Berkeley for Speech) in 1968 from the University of California, Berkeley, and I did graduate study at the University of Maryland, College Park, in 1984. In between the B.A. and M.A. at UC Berkeley, I got both a B.D. and M.R.E. degree from the Golden Gate Baptist Seminary in Berkeley. |
MY LIFE AS A TEACHER
 After several years as pastor, music director, educational director of Southern Baptist Churches and Chaplain for Southern Baptists at the University of California, Berkeley, beginning in 1969 I taught Speech Communication and English Composition at  Merced College, (a community college in Merced, California) for 28 years before retiring in May, 1997.
When I first came to the college, I taught English Composition and Public Speaking, since Dr. Barker, the president, felt that all teachers should teach in two areas.  Later, after introducing Group Discussion and Interpersonal Communication into the curriculum, I taught only speech: public speaking, group discussion, intercollegiate forensics, interpersonal communication, readers' theater, and oral interpretation of literature. My favorite class was Interpersonal Communication, and in that class, I had the opportunity to thoroughly explore the topic of listening and teach Active Listening.
 In the summer of 1976 I took a sabbtical leave from the college and attended the Readers' Theatre Institute in London, England, sponsored by the California State University in San Diego. Since I taught forensics at the college, and since that included Readers' Theater, this institute was most helpful. Not only did we learn the fundamentals of readers' theater, but we put on such a program, we visited plays, and had such guests as Sir John Gielgud and Diana Ross.
 From January through May of 1984, I did graduate study at the University of Maryland in Listening. My teacher was Dr. Andrew Wolvin, who, at that time, was president of the International Listening Association. With Dr. Wolvin's guidance I was able to assist him in compiling an extensive bibliography in listening and eventually present a paper at the ILA's annual meeting.
 As a teacher, I always included units on listening in all my courses, because I felt that it was one of the least mastered communication skills. One of the techniques I taught, and continued to teach at the Challenger Learning Center, was Active Listening, which I discuss more thoroughly on my Home Page. |
  MY WORK AFTER RETIREMENT
 This is a picture of me in my Challenger space suit, and for three years after I retired from teaching, I was employed part-time as a Flight Director at the Challenger Learning Center in Atwater, California (at the former Castle Air Force Base), where they run simulated missions to rendezvous with Comet Halley, land on the moon, and travel to Mars. Challenger center serves school districts in 14 counties in the San Joaquin Valley, and it also conducts corporate training programs for private businesses and public agencies through Merced College.
 I was 69 years old when I last worked for Challenger, and you may think it strange that a man my age would have such a job. But if John Glenn, who was 77 in July, 1998, could be a Payload Specialist on the successful Space Shuttle Discovery, on their mission in October, 1998, then I felt like a young man doing this job.
GREAT NEWS! The center received a 1.6 million loan from USDA Rural Development Department for the renovation of a former 57,000 square foot classroom building into the "Castle Discovery Center of Science and Technology." It is similiar to the exploratorium in San Francisco and is open to children and adults year-round. This exciting hands-on exhibit has cutting edge technology that can be enjoyed by the whole family. |
MY FAMILY
 I am married with two grown sons (Jeff is the one on the far left and Steve is the one on the far right in the picture on the right) and two grandaughters, Amy and Maddy, 17 and 13 now, who are in the picture on the left. My wife VERA is retired from retail sales, and she and I have been married since 1955. 
 We love to garden, with tomatoes as a specialty, and using as many organic methods as possible; I discuss more of that on my Gardening Page. |
LANDMARK EDUCATION HELPED ME FOCUS ON WHO I REALLY AM
It was participation in a Landmark Education "Forum" in Modesto, California, several years ago, that helped give me a whole new perspective on who I was and what I could do with my life. They taught that the past was useful as a learning experience, but that we should not define who we are from the past. We should see ourselves as a possibility (future), but accept the possibility as reality (bring it into the present). Such a shift will release all kinds of creative energies for our everyday tasks and relationships. I now define myself as the possibility of acknowledging people as truly unique and worthwhile.
Their organization is listed on the links below, and it helps people, no matter how old, or in what profession, to reenergize and refocus their lives.
EVENTS VERSUS INTERPRETATION
 Another thing I learned in the Landmark "Forum" was that there's a difference between what happens in life and our interpretation of it. Someone may say something or do something, and that is the "event." What we make that event mean is our "interpretation" of it. Sometimes people think that the event and the interpretation are one and the same thing, but they are not. A conclusion we can draw from this idea is that we can make what people say and do mean whatever we want them to mean. They do not have to mean one thing. If we want them to be negative, we can make them negative. If we want them to be positive, then we can make them positive. Perhaps if we are having difficulties in our relationships, then we could begin to redefine what people are saying and doing "mean" to us.
CREATE A POSITIVE ENVIRONMENT
 Because we have the power to interpret "events" (what people say and do), I have decided to create a positive environment of meaning around me where I can live a healthy and productive life. I will purposefully look for the positive interpretations of those events in my life instead of negative interpretations.
 There is so much skepticism and paranoia today that our relationships with each other are being poisoned. Trust is becoming difficult to establish and maintain, and we are losing the benefits of the love and caring that come with trust. I think, however, that we can create our own positive environment whenever we realize that we create the meanings that people's words and actions have for us.
 Beginning in 2000, my wife and I built a new home in Merced, and we also began rebuilding our spiritual life, which we had neglected since the early 70's. We joined the Christian Life Center in Merced, where I work in the seniors group and sing in the choir. I am active in a Thursday morning discussion group. |
MOST OF THE GRAPHICS ON THIS PAGE ARE � ARTTODAY.
� 1998 -- 2009 by the 4 Star Listening Post.
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