Gratitude List: 10 Deceased People

To keep this list manageable for me personally, I have established an additional stipulation:  I must have had the chance to interact with each of them within the span of my own life.  Once again, names are in no particular order.

1.  Michael L. Cahoon:  I could never have been the woman I am today without him in my life.

2.  Carol Hansen Hatch:  My mom . . .'nuff said.

3.  Michael Cosola:  A former student, one of those I met my first year teaching overseas at Ulm American High School.  He changed me.  (Although he died in 1993, I didn't learn of his death until 2006.  I still remember crying at while sitting at my desk in front of the computer.)

4.  Adrian Petersen Hansen:  My maternal grandmother.  Her words and example helped shaped my concept of what it means to be a real woman and a true daughter of God.

5.  Henry Daniel Hansen:  My maternal grandfather.  He and Grandma Hansen embodied my first rendering of what grandparents are.  I can remember sitting on his lap when I was three or four and feeling safe and content in a circle of family. In my early twenties when I was with a friend, I entered a bar for the first time ever.  That night I learned that a scent I always associated with my grandpa and the security of his love was actually a combination of cigarettes and whiskey on the breath.  I still like the smell.

6.  Ruth Hansen:  My aunt.  She added facets to my perception of womanhood and then augmented and emboldened my perspective of what a woman can actually do in this world.

7.  Peter Kandrat:  My Algebra 1 teacher at Summit Junior High.  Always somewhat in awe of him--okay, even a bit scared at moments--I knew even back then that he was an amazing teacher; in fact, he was a game-changing teacher for me.  By the time I met him, I had decided that I hated math and that I would never take another math class as soon as I had enough credits to graduate.  Even though I think I never earned higher than a B in math that year, after his class I never again collected a final grade lower than an A in all subsequent math classes.  He shared his passion for math and rekindled my interest; I opted to take math every year in high school.  [Although I thought Mr. Kandrat was old when he was my teacher in junior high--the perspective of youth, no doubt--when I looked for him on the Internet before writing this list, I discovered that he had died in 2006 at the age of 93!]

8.  Virginia Silcox:  My AP English teacher at Skyline HIgh School.  [My Internet research shows she may not really be an admissable part of this list because I could only discover that currently she would be 88 years old, so she may very well be alive!  However, I really need her on one of my lists!]  In my view, Mrs. Silcox knew everything there was to know about English; she was the most brilliant woman I ever met next to my mother.  I remember how she would laugh when we were reading Shakespeare aloud and I was not entirely sure why it was funny, but I sure wanted to find out!  Most of all, Mrs. Silcox taught me why poetry intrigued me and she legitimized my love for it.

9.  Neal A. Maxwell:  Because he came to Germany and spoke at a church meeting I attended when I lived there, I am claiming that our life paths crossed in the flesh.  I always liked listening to Elder Maxwell speak and reading what he wrote because of how he could use words to express and illuminate the density and complexity of his thinking and understanding of things of the spirit.  I can review and ponder his words again and again and each time assemble a slightly fuller synthesis--kind of like reading poetry!

10. Dr. August Jaussi (and Dr. R.W. Heninger--who is still alive):  These two men were the professors in the Zoology Department at BYU for whom I worked as a part-time secretary during my first two years as a student there.  The summer after I graduated from high school I began working for them as a totally inexperienced and rather shy 18-year-old freshman who hadn't figured out much in the way of who she was or what she wanted to do.  Dr. Jaussi, always such a gentleman, was especially kind and patient.  Dr. Heninger was definitely gruffer, but we grew to enjoy and appreciate each other.  Both of them took time to coach me--not only as a secretary, but also as a seeker of knowledge and as a human being.