"Jesus Christ, Carpenter" and Elton John

The other night I was driving with our son, Ethan. Out of the blue my eight-year-old boy said, "Daddy are you ever going back to work again?"

Startled, I said, "I just don't know. The stroke really did a number on me. I just do not know if I can work anymore. And that is sad for me."

He said, "Strokes really suck don't they, Dad?"

Then he said, "If you don't go back to work, what do you think you'll do every day?"

When my dad retired at 53, it was very hard for him. His identity was wrapped in the fact that he worked at Buttrey Foods and before that the B&B in Kalispell, Montana.

When Buttrey Foods "big wigs" told my dad that he would be "retired" (Actually it was a cost saving measure because his pension was getting too expensive for the company so they actually fired him), it was a major shock for him and our family.

Dad started work delivering newspapers when he was about 10, and he never stopped working.

So for 43 years he worked hard. Then, at 53 years old, suddenly he had no job, prospects, and no hobbies. He was devastated.

My dad's identity was "Stanford A. Dunham, Merchandising Manager for Buttrey Foods."

Something like "Jesus Christ, Carpenter."

Now he was just "Stan Dunham."

I suspect that my dad listed his “occupation” before "father." That was common in his era.

When dad was dying, he told me that one of his biggest regrets that he worked so hard to provide for his family he nearly lost his sons. He lost his wife, Dad told me.

I thought a lot about my dad lately. I started to work when I was 10 years old. I worked at my stepdad's furniture store, and I moved on to be a carpet layer and a carpenter with my brothers.

I went to college, and I got a great job: CEO of the Idaho Association of REALTOR'S. Through the years, actually I had several other professional high-profile jobs: Boise State University lobbyist and Interim Vice President of Institutional Advancement for Boise State. I opened a real estate school, and then the Vice President of the Idaho Association of Commerce and Industry. Finally I was the Executive Director of the Associated General Contractors of Idaho. I was also elected to be one of the Trustees for the College Western Idaho.

My point about this, my identity was about my jobs. I was "Mark P Dunham, CEO and college trustee." I am a father but I didn't think about that as part of my identity really. “This is my job.”

But my stroke messed up my future and my identity.

Just like my dad, 43 years his job was his identity. Ironically, I worked for 42 years and then suddenly my job identity -- my job -- was gone.

It reminds me of a beautiful and heart wrenching song from Elton John "This Train Don't Stop There Anymore:"

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZrP8tCsYQXA

"I used to be the main express

All steam and whistles heading west

Picking up my pain from door to door

Riding on the storyline

Furnace burning overtime

But this train don't stop,

This train don't stop,

This train don't stop there anymore."

I feel like I worked so hard for years, and in one instant, it was gone.

I wish that I had talked to my dad about his retirement.

I am now "period" rather than "comma."

The Two Faces of the American Dream

The massive wave of Norwegian immigration to Minnesota from the 1850s through the early 20th century wasn't a casual choice; it was an escape from crushing land scarcity and economic desperation. My ancestors, the Dunhams, arrived in 1851 and built a life in Otter Tail County in Minnesota. My great-great-grandfather, Jens Christian Dunham, didn’t just survive—he thrived. He served in the Minnesota legislature as a Republican from 1888 to 1890 and later became a staunch advocate for President Teddy Roosevelt. He was the literal embodiment of the American Dream: an immigrant who fled poverty to become a lawmaker in his new home. Fast forward a century, and a new wave of immigrants—this time from Somalia—is following that exact same blueprint. Like the Norwegians before them, they fled hardship to build a future in Minnesota, and many have run for office to serve the state that welcomed them. Yet, the political rhetoric surrounding these two groups couldn't be more polarized. Don...

Phantom Blindness and Taking a Break after Strokes

I met with my eye doctor last week about taking some time off from my vision therapy. I have been doing therapy since my stroke almost two and a half years ago. I am tired, and a need a break. My doctor said, “This is completely understandable. Take some time off.” At the appointment, my doctor tested my vision. Because of the strokes, my vision was affected, and I have a problem in my field of vision on the right side. I have a deficit with my right side peripheral vision. However, it is getting better. During the test, I told him that I “sense things on the right side of my peripheral vision.” It seems that I know that something is there, but I cannot really distinguish what it is. He told me that there is a body of thought describing phantom vision or phantom blindness. A Polish researcher, L. Bieganowski, described this phantom blindness this way: “The subject of the paper is the phenomenon of phantom vision. It occurs among the blind (or almost blind...

Greek orthodox and Catholic‘s

Being a history buff, I’ve always understood that the Catholic Church was split in about 1000 A.D. Our Greek tour guide mentioned the differences a little bit yesterday, but she did not capture the full history. Today I saw a small Greek orthodox by the roadside and I’m going to insert about the history. Eastern Orthodox Catholics and Roman Catholics are the result of what is known as the East-West Schism (or Great Schism) of 1054, when medieval Christianity split into two branches. The Byzantine split with Roman Catholicism came about when Pope Leo III crowned Charlemagne, King of the Franks, as Holy Roman Emperor in 800. From the Byzantine viewpoint, this was a slap to the Eastern Emperor and the Byzantine Empire itself — an empire that had withstood barbarian invasions and upheld the faith for centuries. After Rome fell in 476, Byzantium was the only vestige of the Holy Roman Empire. Charlemagne’s crowning made the Byzantine Emperor redundant, and relations between the East and...

Dunham Family and My Stroke Story!

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