Integrity

Tonight's newspaper had someone grabbing the headlines...

and up in the smaller spot, appropriately above the fray, someone smiling and showing us the way.

Take a look for yourself:

Chancellor Katehi meet Jim Sochor.

Jim Sochor was the beloved football (and golf) coach for UC Davis for 30 years.

He was humble and soft spoken.

He was a gifted listener and genuine in every way.

People responded to his work ethic.

His kindness.

His ability to out-perform against more talented and more funded football programs.

Mostly, they knew they were in the presence of integrity.

He was honest.

Dependable.

Real.

True to his word.

Chancellor Katehi, are you listening?

There is a reason that Coach Sochor could walk around town 

and talk to anybody at any time with that shy smile.

He was approachable and appreciative.

We could feel his authenticity.

He was the definition of beloved and admired.

In this time of uncertainty and shady-doings by our Chancellor, 

Jim Sochor's legacy is a reminder of what an Aggie really is.

UC Davis isn't lost.

We know what is valued.

We're not flashy...

or shady...

or attention-seeking...

We're the Jim Sochor version:

head down, working hard,

letting the effort and the work speak for itself,

finding a way to be the best when the odds are against us.

This quote is what it means to be an Aggie:

"We knew that everybody we played would be bigger, stronger, faster and 

more talented than we were. 

We had to find a way. 

And that way was that no one would be closer as a team than we would be. 

Our central values became trust, unity, togetherness." 

-- Jim Sochor in a 2007 interview

Trust - Unity - Togetherness

This, right here, is the way we find our way back.

Our path to healing.

I went to school at UC Davis when Trust, Unity and Togetherness were real 

and available right on campus...

students, they still are -- available right this minute.

Integrity matters.

We can lift the pepper-sprayed pages of our recent history and dive deeper to to our shared history with this man who leaves such a remarkable legacy.

He leaves a legacy of love.

Friendship.

Kindess.

Care.

Those who knew Jim Sochor well - and even those of us who only knew him from short, quick limited conversations - knew what mattered most to him:

family.

But, funny enough, he pretty much considered all of Davis to be his family...

and we all happily signed up to stand in his sunshine.

We each get to choose how we spend our days.

Our micro-choices add up.

Do we choose kindness?

Unity?

Trust?

I do.

I choose Jim Sochor's Aggie Pride.everytime.

Instead of Googling pepper spray,

Google Jim Sochor.

Google Larry Vanderhoef while you're at it.

Those two don't need any internet scrubbing. 

Just a chance to internet shine.

This coming Saturday will be a day that we all stop and remember a terrific human.

He's deeply missed...his absence so painfully noticeable.

But, he crossed our path for a reason.

He showed us how.

Strive for unity, trust and togetherness.

Seek the good.

Stay honest.

Work hard...and make the magic happen.

Jim did.

We can too.

"Fame is a vapor.

Popularity an accident.

Riches take wings.

Only one thing endures

and that is character."

-- Horace Greeley

I Never Said Thanks...

"We all mold one another's dreams.  We all hold each other's fragile hopes in our hands.  We all touch each other's hearts."

My path only crossed hers once...only one brief moment four years ago at a Back to School Night.  At the time, my daughter was a freshman and she was the art teacher.  She was exuberant.  She was warm and friendly.  She was passionate about art and grateful to be teaching it. She had such a great energy to her that I wanted to linger and I did.  I walked around her room slowly searching the pictures for clues to this person.  I wanted to know more of her story. I remember feeling so grateful that Mary Kate got to spend 50 minutes of every day at school with this warm light of acceptance and encouragement.  I left without telling her that.  In my mind it was enough to just feel it in my heart.  I left without looking her in the eye and thanking her.  I moved on into a dark night and a busy life.

Now it's too late.

Yesterday, Kathy Carlisle, was struck by a train while taking a photograph.

"It is with great sorrow that I share with you the loss of a valuable member of our St. Francis community, Kathy Carlisle. 

Kathy, a beloved member of our faculty in her sixth year teaching art, painting, sculpting, and photography was struck by a train Saturday near the school doing what she loved - engaging in her passion for photography. Her family was notified by authorities Saturday evening.

Our thoughts and prayers go out to Kathy’s husband Steve Jarvis and children Will, Bianca, and Violet, who is a freshman at St. Francis.

Kathy was a passionate artist, and dedicated teacher to her students. She possessed the ability to teach students to connect to their audience through art and showed them the incredible power of photography to tell a story or convey a message.

The entire St. Francis community mourns this tremendous loss of our colleague Kathy. We reach out to her family and close friends and hold them in our thoughts and embrace during this difficult time."

 She was pursuing her passion and engrossed in the moment.  Our world lost a bright light.  We lost a teacher who cared.  We lost a woman who took the time to connect with her students.  She said hi every day to Mary Kate this year, four years later, because once she was your teacher, she was always your teacher.  We lost someone who cared deeply; who molded hearts and minds and helped awkward teen-age girls feel beautiful and smart through art and photography.  Her sunshine is gone and we all feel the loss.

So, Kathy Carlisle, thank you for your love and energy and time.  I'm grateful we crossed paths if only one time.  You lived your life well.  You showed an entire high school of girls how to mix motherhood and teaching and art into a beautiful palette.  That won't be forgotten.  Your handprint is on Mary Kate's heart...and many others.  Your legacy is your love and warmth...and your art. 

Thank you.

**This piece of art is from a student at St. Francis High School -- I do not know the artist. **

Silver Lake...so little and so much

Caroline enjoying the beauty of Rim Rock.

"Everybody needs beauty as well as bread, places to play in and pray in, where nature may heal and give strength to body and soul." -- John Muir

In 1938, a tiny lady from the central valley of California sought refuge from the blazing summer heat in the woods near a lake.  She built a cabin from the surrounding pine and stone, intentionally setting the cabin up on a hill to enjoy the view, Mary Goni created a lasting legacy -- one that would continue for generations.  Her attention to detail was exquisite.  This cabin was no quick project.  She built a smaller cabin to house herself as she created her dream house.  She weathered the winter and braved the lack of electricity and basic conveniences all to create a space, a refuge, a haven from the work-a-day world.  Mary was an avid birder and her copious careful notes about the birds and animals around Silver Lake serve as a talisman to those early years.  She was a visionary and I often think of her as I enjoy the fruits of her labor every summer.  

Mary dreamed big.

Almost every summer since John was in diapers he has spent time there.  There are stories of his mom dragging the unceasing cloth diapers of a set of twins through the lake tethered to a canoe; stories of wandering for hours through the forests and climbing the famed cliff of huge boulders that borders one entire side of the lake.  John knows every nook and cranny to Silver Lake and the surrounding meadow, forests and hiking trails.  

When we were in college, John told me about his family's cabin at the lake and took me there one summer week-end.  I was expecting a small cabin: sturdy, spartan and stoic. I gasped when I got there. 

 Silver Lake is a study in contradictions.

It is elegant and roomy; bold yet unobtrusive.  It is is jaw-droppingly gorgeous and yet functions without electricity.  It has plumbing but the water is always precarious and requires use of an outhouse. It inspires and comforts.  Mostly it directs your eye and focuses your vision on the surrounding simple beauty of a forest and a lake -- unchanged and timeless.  Universal in its beauty and its simplicity.  Cloaked in the sounds of silence and nature, this "cabin" provides a retreat from the modern world that is unmatched.  There is no cell reception. No connectivity.  It is remote and isolated.  The nearest town is a thirty minute drive.  No Starbucks.  No television.  Nowhere to go but outdoors and into the forest. Nowhere to hide from your thoughts  -- nothing to do or notice but the natural gifts all around you. 

Since our kids have been going since they were infants, Silver Lake is something they beg for.  The teen-agers don't complain about the lack of cell reception.  They don't mind missing texts or catching up on Facebook.  They crave the quiet.  They stock up on books to read.  They beg for extra days.  They plan the multi-day Monopoly game and anticipate the fires that last for hours and the conversations that leisurely develop when you have nothing but time and no distractions.  Mary Kate is greedy with her time at Silver Lake...anxious to get back to the lake after an inevitable outing into town to stock up on supplies.  Grumbling she wishes we didn't have to leave, ever.

Mary Goni lived an astonishing 102 years, on her terms and in her way, but I so wish Mary could see her Mary Kate and know that she did it...she passed the torch.  She touched her heart and she created an environmentalist, a naturalist and a devotee to Silver Lake that will only, could only, get passed on as well.  Mary Kate isn't the only one by any means.  Siblings and cousins and uncles and aunts feel the same way about this treasure.  

Without electricity, we naturally get in the rhythm of the natural light and we find our way back to our roots...back to what matters.  Back to ourselves and back to our family.  Back even to our ancestors.

I wonder about this timeless treasure.  For how long can cell reception and the outside world be held at bay?  How will it be if the invisible circle of reception opens and the world pushes its way inside?  Will future generations ever know or understand the silence of wilderness? The sense of remoteness that is simultaneously haunting and freeing? 

I know we will work to delay the inevitable.  In almost 80 years, Silver Lake remains unchanged. I pray that it can stay unharmed, unknown and untouched. 

Today I am grateful for a stubborn woman named Mary Goni who dared to dream, sought it to fruition and kept it like a careful treasure. Thank you, Mary, for countless moments as a family, for helping me to see the beauty in natural light and the preciousness of running water and the gifts and glory of unabashed nature.  Thank you for this amazing gift: Silver Lake.