Letter to my Father

I have given myself an hour to write this.
Less than 0.00017% of the time you, my father, have been alive.
Who was 50% of of the equation that started 100% of my existence.

Today, on your birthday, as I near the age when you and mom were preparing for me, I have to reflect on what I've accomplished with the life you gave me, the moral and operating code you both taught me, and the foundation from which I launched into adulthood.

It's impossible to remember every lesson, every argument, every conversation, every gift, every action taken to support me, and even harder to fully grasp the motivations behind each decision.  It's just as difficult to choose a gift for a parent, who has a head-start on acquiring what they want, whose more complex, whose been around longer, whose tastes come from a different age that I weren't alive for.  But I think, at this halfway point, at the dusk of my youth, the end of the era when I can be called a "young man," I think I have an idea.

I will try my best to describe all that I believe you tried to teach me, and also what I believe to be my accomplishments.  Mom gets plenty of credit, but my accomplishments are both of yours, and my character has some traits that I got from you alone.  So, with a tall cup of green tea in arms reach of the keyboard, here goes...

In no particular order, what I learned or mimicked from my father

1. Leave emotion out of business

2. Always do the right thing

3. Whenever and wherever you can help, do

4. Volunteering is important

5. With true friends, you can build anything

6. Pay what you owe on time, every time

7. Only spend money on things that last

8. Apple computers are more than the sum of their parts (age 6 I believe was when this came to me)

9. Item 8 is applicable to everything

10. Take care of the people who work with and for you first

11. Question everything

12. Knowledge is available, don't just expect people around you to have all the answers

13. Business requires trust first

14. Family can let you down, but don't give up on them

15. Never forget where you come from

16. Our nation was paid for in blood

17. Government is a wonderful human invention, in the right hands

18. Voting, taxes, and citizenship are a small price to pay for the freedom and privilege of living in the United States of America

19. History is as important as math

20. Take time to travel

21. Mom is the most important person in the world, even though we're bad at showing it

22. Never sign something you haven't read

23. If it isn't in writing, it isn't an agreement

24. Stand up for those who can't

25. Protect those who have less power than you

26. Speak out against corruption

27. Point out bullshit

28. Never ignore or allow prejudice

In no particular order, things I've done in life so far

1. Learn to read, write, and do math

2. Finished elementary school

3. Directed the lighting for a middle school play

4. Finished middle school

5. Helped film high school drama class "Whose Line Is It?" night

6. Got accepted into college at 16

7. Finished my AA and high school diploma at 18

8. Got into a University

9. Taught as a volunteer at an elementary school

10. Helped lead a Habitat for Humanity project in Georgia for Spring Break

11. Got a paid internship

12. Got accepted to assist and work with graduate research students as an undergraduate

13. Convinced company I was interning at to give me the same responsibilities as employees

14. Finished my bachelors degree in Computer Engineering while minoring in Cognitive Science, with honors

15. Got into graduate school

16. Finished my Masters in Computer Engineering

17. Got a job offer from San Diego to work in the civil service

18. Revamped an existing internal application to save shipping and receiving department ~$400 a day

19. Demanded that others in the hiring program I was brought on through be handled better and given more agency in our careers

20. Founded monthly meetings for everyone in that program, as well as setting up a Wiki so that everyone after me can keep a history and share information freely

21. Joined local debate and discussion group and was asked to join the leadership team to keep the group going

22. Setup a big data architecture in a local cloud and on AWS that is still being used today

23. Began IT consulting for law firms in dire need of cleaning up and getting their systems to work for more than a week at a time

24. Began helping organize dance events around San Diego and some in Los Angeles

25. Traveled through 7 countries in 6 months to cleanup a Windows based mess across government owned systems, ensuring that everywhere I went, I left it better than I found it and the local tech support was capable to finish the job without our help

26. Started a non-profit, twice a year weekend festival that encourages cross training in body movement and getting more people dancing and/or practicing martial arts

27. Hosted two 30 attendee debate nights around the California propositions in 2014 and 2015

28. Received an award at work for playing a crucial part in the international Windows cleanup effort

29. Lost 40 pounds of body fat over 3 months after realizing I had let stress and work affect my health

I seem to only recall 28 things for each list, and maybe that's how early life is.  I'm not ready to invest, or at least not seeing interest on non-monetary investments.  Every solid lesson in my youth generates at least one accomplishment.  And now, as my 30th birthday looms just beyond yours, it seems the cards in my hand are ready to be played to unlock my potential, so that I can start tipping the ratio of accomplishments to life lessons above 1 to 1.

Thank you Father
And happy birthday

Your son
Philip
 

What real and lasting change do you want to create?

The beautiful thing about combining writing with today's technology is you legitimately have the chance to make a meaningful impact on the world and those around you - assuming you find the right cause to get behind and the community to rally in your corner.

But all that starts with a massive desire to make some type of a difference in the world. And that often begins with just a small desire to change things - which grows inside you over time.

So what difference do you want to make in the world? What impact do you want to have? How do you want to make things a little better for society? What do you want to be remembered for once you're gone? Think back on what makes you really angry about the world too - that can help spur things.

Start small and just let a few ideas flow for a few hundred words or more. Don't judge what comes out and don't expect your first answer to be your life's work (although it might be). This is where 'being the change' begins.

Have fun with it and we'll see you tomorrow for our final day of this little challenge of ours.

Citizenship over consumerism

I have a lot of problems with Hillary Clinton.

As an adult, I understand that I don't always get what I want, and I have to make the best of the choices I have available at the time. More importantly, I have to take responsibility for my actions. Protest voting doesn't send a message, it at most makes you feel like you stuck it to the man for a few minutes, and after that someone you didn't want is in the white house for 4 years.

For everyone wishing for another candidate, I feel you, this should have been the year of a third party. Never before in my lifetime have we had such a circus of an election, and two major candidates that unite the country in distaste and distrust, founded or not.

Most importantly, looking at how capable a candidate is to accomplish legislative work, both Hillary and Trump can accomplish the most among all of our options. Voting for anyone else, even if they somehow won, won't create forward momentum that is desperately needed.
With that in mind, one of them will at worst continue the last 8 years of policy, while the other candidate will trade the power of the presidency for any form of personal gain and ego stroking they are offered, to the highest bidder go our most sacred rights and assets.

If you're lucky enough to be eligible to vote, then you must take responsibility for your vote. The very fact that you are eligible to vote in the United States means you stand on a mountain of privilege, so vote, as your neighbors certainly are. Carefully consider each candidates possibility of winning, consider the absolute worst you can imagine that candidate doing, and imagine the absolute best outcome of their four years in office.

Humanity has undergone turmoil, wars, and worse for us to reach our current form of government, we don't get to whine about our available candidates for a few weeks, and then not once call, email, or write to our government representatives, much less never serve in the civil service. If you are unhappy with your options this year, you have four years to get involved in your local, state, and federal government. But first, you absolutely have to pick among the options set before you, the options we as a nation have earned by neglect and not standing up for our fellow citizens.

Choose wisely, with your reason and knowledge, and leave your emotion at home. Our government is in dire need of stern, patient parenting that we have neglected to provide.

So join me and over 130 million others that will, and vote.