[JMR202001151908: Backup]
Chapter 0: The Second μComputer Revolution: an Alternate History
Chapter 1 -- Homecoming Dance
When I went to Japan from the Missionary Training Center, I departed from Salt Lake City, changing planes at Seattle, and flying from there to Tokyo Haneda airport.
On my way back, I flew out of the new Tokyo Narita airport, transferring at San Francisco and El Paso, arriving at Midland Air Field. MAF was an international airport, so I went through customs there.
Mom held up the keys to the truck when she saw me coming through the boarding tunnel.
"Dad's teaching. He has the Colt, so you get to drive the truck. You do want to drive, don't you?"
I grinned. "Yep."
"Oh, give me a hug. You aren't too big to kiss your Ma now, are you?"
In spite of all the uncertainties, it was good to be back home in west Texas after all.
There was plenty of room for my luggage in the bed of the old F-100, even with the big tea Box I had picked up to transfer with. Those wooden tea boxes lined with sheet metal are not nearly as cheap and available now as they were then. They made sense for transfers then. They don't now. Things have changed.
I was probably one of the last missionaries to bring one home.
I loaded my luggage under the camper shell and walked around the truck, checking the vehicle and the parking lot, then got behind the wheel. It had been two years, but it felt just as natural as if it had been yesterday.
"Fixed most the dents." We considered ourselves conscientious about others' property. Family property, maybe not so much. Both the truck and the Colt station wagon had dents from getting them in and out of the spacious parking in front of our house. Too much space, and I guess we forgot to be careful.
"Dad's students." Many of the students in Dad's Spanish classes were also taking vocational ed classes, and, like most of the professors there, Dad would sometimes let them work on our cars for projects in their coursework.
I took my usual care getting out of the parking lot, running through the H shift pattern with the shifter on the steering column twice before I put it again into reverse, checked the mirrors, and eased the clutch back, watching over my shoulder through the back window and in the mirrors as I backed the truck out of the parking space into the access lane.
It is one of the ironies of interface, that standard driver jargon talks about the clutch opposite the clutch's actual function. You know, pushing the pedal down actually releases the clutch so you can shift, and letting the pedal up engages it so you can move the car. But most people say it backwards, "engaging the clutch" when they are actually engaging the clutch release function, etc. We abbreviate the name of the clutch release to "clutch", and the meaning of the word inverts in the vernacular. The function name follows naturally.
I think about things like that, and I may have been thinking about it then.
"There's a new highway. Do you want to take it?"
"Sure." I let the truck roll back to a stop, then shifted to first and headed for the airport exit.
"Turn right as you leave the airport instead of left."
I followed the signs from airport and put the truck on the new local highway to Odessa. Of course I didn't recognize the road, but I recognized the general features of west Texas and I knew which direction I was headed. No getting lost on this new highway.
"Thanksgiving dance tonight at church. Are you up to it?"
"Oh? Mission president said it would be okay, so, yeah. Wouldn't miss it."
In the past, missionaries would wait to be interviewed by their home stake presidents before they would consider themselves released from the more strict rules of social conduct that full-time missionaries obliged themselves to follow.
My mission president, in my final interview, gave me to understand that I would not be released from my obligation to continue preaching the gospel. But he also told me that my new assignment required social interaction, and most of the special restrictions for full-time missionaries no longer applied once I was in the care of my family.
Taking a detour for a date on the flight home would be discouraged, but once my family picked me up at the airport, anything I would normally do as a member of the Church would be okay.
I would still meet with the Stake President within a week or two, to be formally released from my full-time calling, and I would still give my final report to the high council, but I would not need to feel restricted about things like dances, and even dates, if the leaders could not fit me into their schedules beforehand.
So I went to the dance. Strangely, what felt odd was not the being without a companion, not the freedom to dance, but letting someone else be the one providing the sound system, letting someone else work the turntable. One of the younger young men of the ward who was now preparing for his own mission had taken over the dance music duties while I was gone.
I got to focus on dancing.
Very few of the young women in the group I had grown up with were there. Most were off to school. Some were already married. Many of the young men I had hung around with were at school or still on their missions.
My best church friend's little sister was there. Really cute little sister, now grown up, now a really good-looking woman. Would I be emphasizing it too much if I admit she had her own beauty?
She had a facial scar from a childhood operation. Plastic surgery was not as advanced back then, insurance not as comprehensive, and money tighter in general, so the operation restored her health, but did not remove the nominal blemish.
Her family was supportive. The people at church here were also, relatively speaking, supportive. I think the Lubbock Ward members were too, after they moved to Lubbock. School, not so much. She had to develop a certain toughness.
But she had learned to let herself shine through. And she really was beautiful, scar included.
"Lizzie Ann! How's things? Lute with you?"
"Great. No, he's still in Guatemala. He'll be another couple of months."
"What're you up to? In Lubbock?"
"Nursing school in Roswell. We heard about the dance here, so we came to crash it."
She indicated two young women that were with her, and I introduced myself.
"So you're back from Japan," she prompted.
"Yeah, just came in today. Mom told me about the dance."
"Guess you haven't talked with the stake president yet."
"Nope. But the mission president told me I can dance now I'm home. Want to dance?"
"Yeah!" She turned to her friends and excused herself, and we went back into the gym. We closed to ballroom position and began two-stepping to a country ballad.
"You'll ask my roommates to dance, too, right?"
"Of course."
While we danced and talked, I considered asking her out. But the thought of driving 200 miles to Roswell to see her got in the way. And something just didn't click. Might have been Beryl. Might have been other things.
I have sometimes regretted not asking her out while she was there that night. She'd known me for a long time, and, of all the women I have known, she may have been the most ready to understand me as I was, as I am.
I danced well more than half the dances. Lizzie Ann and her roommates got their share, but I danced with most of the other young single women there, as well. I had not really interacted much with the group two years younger than me before my mission, so I didn't feel like I knew them that well. But they remembered me and they knew I liked to dance. And they all knew I wasn't into kissing, so no one was worried about that.
Oh, yeah, one of the young guys asked me if I were planning on kissing anybody, since the mission president had said it was all right to dance. I think I laughed it off. "Not gonna try workin' that fast."
Why it always felt to me like the young women my own age were scared I was going to try to kiss them, I'm not sure. Maybe it was all in my own head. I sure had never tried to kiss anyone. Never had kissed anyone besides my mom and my sisters. I would be 26 before my first kiss.
Some people doubt me when I say it. What can I say? It was not my goal. It just didn't happen. What was not was not.
When asked about my plans, I talked about taking general education classes at Odessa College, where my dad taught, while looking for a full four-year college to go to. It would save me a lot of money.
I still was not really considering Brigham Young University, although, for extending my Japanese language skills, BYU would be the logical choice.
After the closing prayer was said and the last song played and danced to, I stayed to help clean up, then went home and went to bed.
During the weeks that followed, I applied for readmission to Odessa College, went to talk with the stake leaders, and generally tried to figure my life out.
Beryl, the girl I had nursed a terrible crush on since middle school, whom I had written to during the first year of my mission, and who had replied maybe twice, was in Lubbock attending Texas Tech. My best friend outside of church, Rodrick, was there, too. And Texas Tech was a pretty decent technical school, even had a good school of medicine which Lute would be attending when he got back from his mission.
I called Beryl and she said she could talk with me before lunch, on, I think it was, a Thursday.
So I called Rodrick up and he said I could roll out a sleeping bag on his floor so I could check the school out and talk to Beryl in the morning. He indicated he questioned my motivations, my rationality, and my sanity, but other than that did not offer advice. He knew most of my history with Beryl.
Drove three hours to Lubbock the evening before. Rodrick was studying, so we didn't spend more than a half hour talking about the last two years, or our plans for the future. He didn't seem much interested in microprocessors, either, preferring analog circuits. 8080 vs. 6800 was a non-question to him.
In the morning, I went to the school offices and got a course catalog and other information. Then I went to meet Beryl.
I really don't remember our conversation, except that it was strained. I was realizing that I had spent eight years of my life idealizing a young woman when I did not even know enough about her to ask intelligent questions about her life and her plans.
As beautiful as she was, her physical beauty no longer gave me the kind of motivation that had once pushed me out of my comfort zone to talk to her in middle school, that had in times past sent me out now and then just to ride my bike past her house and wonder what she was doing.
I vaguely recall that I mentioned I might be returning to Japan in the future, and that I was studying electronics and planning to study physics, and she didn't seem especially impressed. Japan, especially, didn't seem to interest her. She was proceeding in her study of childhood education, and, ironic as it now seems, that held no interest for me at the time. Church never came up, and while we talked I became sure our differences in religion and culture were as much a barrier to her as they were beginning to feel to me.
I'm not sure what I expected, but there was no chemistry, and no voices of angels telling me to fly in the face of logic and continue my pursuit of her. All I could see was evidence that we had never had much in common and were apparently headed in different directions.
We didn't even talk about having lunch together, just said our goodbyes, and I went back to get my stuff and talk a bit more with Rodrick between his classes, then headed home.
I still, every now and then, wonder whether I made a mistake in letting the differences be too much of a barrier. There must have been some reason for the crush and the torch I had born for eight years, other than her physical beauty and the fact that she had taken the trouble to ask me in 7th grade algebra class why I didn't do homework when it was clear I could make better grades.
On the other hand, making my choices concerning Beryl clear allowed me to pursue a different path.
Crushes.
My sister Louise had explained her philosophy about crushes to me when I was about twelve. Crushes were one kind of love, an appreciation for the good qualities in people. She had crushes on many people, both male and female. None of them were people she was interested in marrying. It was one kind of love, but not the kind of love you give to your marriage partner.
Being in love was different. There were things you only did in marriage, and having crushes, being willing to appreciate the good in others, was not engaging in infidelity to Howard, the guy she was dating and considering marrying at the time.
She was seventeen at the time, and I figured she knew what she was talking about.
It made sense. Not just to my mind, but in my heart, it felt right to be able to love people that I wasn't planning on marrying -- not to want to make love to them, but to appreciate them and their good qualities, to have tender feelings towards them, and to want them to be happy. And even to reach out to help them be happy when I had legitimate opportunity.
And that helped me recognize that I wasn't falling in love with about every girl I met. I just developed crushes easily. And I should not be worried about it.
It was a great burden off my shoulders. If fidelity to the feelings of my heart did not require me to learn to be a Don Juan, neither did fidelity to the people I loved require me to become a King David. (Or a Brigham Young.)
There are things you only do for love in marriage, and if you keep those separate, love can be shared with everyone.
My sister Louise helped me untangle the wisdom of God which I was learning by means of the Spirit of God in my heart, through prayer and studying the scriptures, and separate it from the human wisdom which I was learning from the world around me, from the radio and newspapers, in stores, at school, even through the outward church -- even from ideas I had brought with me from before birth. She helped me see that there would be a way for me to learn the laws of man but follow the laws of God.
I had crushes on my big sisters, too.
Satomi Mihara.
Sister Mihara was a fireball of a missionary. In my first area, Tokorozawa, she had lead out in ways that both helped the Elders and threatened their sense of authority. I think I was not the only one who developed a crush on her. Some resented their feelings toward her, but she seemed able to catch them off their guard and put them at ease.
About half-way through my mission, I had been assigned to Nakano Ward in Tokyo when Sister Mihara was there, and she had encouraged me not to give up trying to learn the lessons we were supposed to teach from. Having her encouragement, I asked the mission president to allow me to study the lesson plans using the Kanji (the Chinese/Japanese logograms commonly used in Japan) instead of the Romaji (Japanese written using the letters of the Latin script which we use in English and many other European languages).
I couldn't see the meaning in the Romaji version of the lesson plans that most foreign missionaries studied from, and, without the meaning, the words and the ideas would not stick in my mind. But Kanjii study had become a temptation to some of the missionaries in the past, and most of the mission organizations in Japan strongly recommended against it -- to the point of making it a mission rule.
So I promised the mission president not to study the Kanji themselves too much, and he gave me special permission to study the lessons from the Kanji version, and I finished learning them in a month.
Somehow, I developed a crush on Sister Mihara's companion, Sister Hummer, too.
While I was in Nakano, I had a dream in which I went in to the mission home for my monthly interview with the mission president, and Sister Mihara and Sister Hummer were waiting outside the mission president's office. I talked with them, then went in to talk with the mission president, and he told me that I would next be assigned to a female companion. I asked who, and he asked me whether I had considered the two sisters I had met coming in. And I acknowledged that I had.
In the light of my experiences since then, I can see that this was a dream influenced by the Holy Spirit, to help me work out essential parts of my path ahead, and that the particulars of the dream were not important. It was something of a metaphor for what my mission president would tell me at the end of my two years, that I was still to be a missionary, that there would be new assignments, and that I would be required to choose for myself, to a certain extent, both my assignments and my companions in those assignments.
At the time, I found myself wondering whether I might find myself being called to get married before my two year assignment as a missionary in Japan was finished. The adversary of our souls has various ways to confuse us, including trying to get us to pervert our revelations of truth.
I talked with the mission president about that dream, and, on the next transfer, I was assigned to Edogawa Ward.
One transfer later, Sister Mihara was assigned to Edogawa, as well. There, during our branch study sessions, she coached me about my shyness, and, in the process, told me she loved me. I understood her to mean it as a fellow missionary, and responded by trying to get out of my shell a bit more.
I was transferred to Kumagaya, the next transfer.
Sister missionaries were called for a year and a half at the time, and Sister Mihara finished her mission a few months later, while I was in Kumagaya. Missionaries were not allowed to write each other during their missions, but after the missions were done, there were no such restrictions. Satomi wrote me a postcard while I was in Kumagaya, and I wrote back.
Now, with my mind clear of concerns about Beryl, I wrote Satomi Mihara a letter asking whether she would consider dating me, if I visited Osaka. That was my awkward way of asking permission to court her.
The lack of Japanese courses at Texas Tech pretty much decided me against applying there, at least not then.
My mom suggested I take the newspaper route back over for school books and dating money, and we went to the circulation office of The Odessa American and made the arrangements. One of my old managers had asked if I was available, and she had taken on one of my old routes while I was on my mission, for exercise and extra money. She said she was now ready to start just walking without the newspapers for exercise.
And I registered for classes and bought books -- general education and electronics classes. Aimed for an Associate's degree in electronics to help get work to support my college, and for classes that would transfer to the four-year school. I didn't want to repeat things I'd learned in high school, and the college let me skip the classes I thought I was good on, so, with permission from the teacher, Jackson Brown, I skipped the introduction to electricity and basic Direct Current (DC) circuits class.
I wanted to skip the Alternating Current (AC) circuits class and go straight to the class in amplifiers and the microprocessors class, but I talked with Denny on the phone, and he suggested I take a few easy classes and give myself a little time for doing other things.
I wanted to finish in a year, if I could, but I allowed him to persuade me. So I signed up for the AC circuits class instead of skipping it.
(FWIW, the real me skipped as many classes as he could, and that caused me trouble in the real world. The version of me in this story is a little smarter.)
The counselors did warn me I might run out of classes for the Associate's degree in electronics if I skipped too many, but we discussed substitutions, and I thought it would work out.
The introduction to microprocessors class would use Intel's 8080, which was disappointing. But Jack was a friend of my dad's, and agreed that he would let me use Motorola's 6800, if I could get the necessary hardware by the time I took the class.
[Backed up at https://joel-rees-economics.blogspot.com/2020/01/bk-33209-homecoming-dance.html.]
[JMR202001151908: End]
[JMR202001042059: Backup]
Chapter 1 -- Homecoming Dance
When I went to Japan from the Missionary Training Center, I flew out from Salt Lake through Seattle to Tokyo Haneda airport. When I came back, I flew out of the new Tokyo Narita airport, through San Francisco and El Paso, to Midland Air Field. MAF was an international airport, so I went through customs there.Mom held up the keys to the truck when she saw me coming through the boarding tunnel.
"Dad's teaching. He has the Colt, so you get to drive the truck. You do want to drive, don't you?"
I grinned. "Yep."
"Oh, give me a hug. You aren't too big to kiss your Ma now, are you?"
It was good to be back home in west Texas.
Plenty of room in the back of the truck for my luggage, including the big tea Box I had picked up to transfer with. Those wooden tea boxes lined with sheet metal are not nearly as cheap and available now as they were then. They made sense for transfers then. They don't now. Things have changed.
I loaded my luggage under the camper shell, and got behind the wheel. It had been two years, but it felt just as natural as if it had been yesterday. I did take a little extra care getting out of the parking lot.
"There's a new highway. Do you want to take it?"
"Sure."
"Turn right as you leave the airport instead of left."
I followed the signs from there and put the truck on the new local highway to Odessa.
"Thanksgiving dance tonight at church. Are you up to it?"
"Oh? Mission president said it would be okay, so, sure."
In the past, missionaries would wait to be interviewed by their home stake presidents before they would consider themselves released from the more strict rules of social conduct that full-time missionaries obliged themselves to follow.
My mission president, in my final interview, gave me to understand that I would not be released from my obligation to continue preaching the gospel. But he also told me that my new assignment required social interaction, and most of the special restrictions for full-time missionaries no longer applied once I was in the care of my family.
Taking a detour for a date on the flight home would be discouraged.
I would still meet with the Stake President to be formally released, and still give my report to the high council, but I would not need to feel restricted about things like dances if the leaders could not fit me into their schedules beforehand.
So I went to the dance. Strangely, what felt odd was not the being without a companion, not the freedom to dance, but letting someone else be the one providing the sound system and working the turntable. One of the younger young men of the ward who was now preparing for his own mission had taken over the dance music duties while I was gone.
Very few of the young women I had grown up with were there. Most were off to school. Some were already married.
My best church friend's little sister was there.
"Lizzie Ann! How're things going? Lute with you?"
"Great. No, he's still in Guatemala. It'll be another couple of months before he's done."
"What are you up to now? Are you in Lubbock?"
"Going to nursing school in Roswell. My roommates and I heard about the dance here, so we came to crash it."
She indicated the two young women that were with her, and I introduced myself.
"So you're back from Japan."
"Yeah, just came in today, and my mom told me about the dance."
"Guess you haven't talked with the stake president yet."
"Nope. But I have been told I can dance. Want to dance?"
"Sure." Lizzie Ann turned to her friends and excused herself, and we went back into the gym. We closed to ballroom position and began two-stepping to a country ballad.
"You'll ask my roommates to dance, too, right?"
"Of course."
While we danced and talked, I considered asking her out. But the thought of driving 200 miles to Roswell to see her got in the way. And something just didn't click.
I have sometimes regretted not asking her out while she was there.
I danced more than half the dances. Lizzie Ann and her roommates got their share, but I danced with most of the other single women there. I had not really interacted much with the group of young women two years younger than me before my mission, so I didn't feel like I knew them that well, but they remembered me and they knew I liked to dance. And they all knew I wasn't into kissing, so there was no pressure about that.
When asked about my plans, I talked about taking classes at Odessa College, where my dad taught, while looking for a full college to go to. It would save me a lot of money. I still was not really considering Brigham Young University, although, for extending my Japanese language skills, that would be a logical choice.
After the closing prayer was said and the last song played and danced to, I stayed to help clean up, then went home and went to bed.
During the weeks that followed, I applied for readmission to Odessa College, went to talk with the stake leaders, and generally tried to figure my life out.
The girl I had written to during the first year of my mission, who had replied maybe twice, was in Lubbock, attending Texas Tech. So was my best non-church friend. And Texas Tech was a pretty decent technical school, even had a good school of medicine which Lute would be attending when he got back from his mission.
I called Beryl and she said she could talk with me before lunch.
So I called Rodrick up and he said I could roll out a sleeping bag on his floor while I checked the school out and talked to Beryl. He indicated he questioned my rationality and my sanity, but other than that did not offer advice.
Drove three hours to Lubbock. Rodrick was studying, so we didn't spend more than an hour talking about the last two years.
In the morning, I went to the school offices and got a course catalog and other information. Then I went to meet Beryl
I really don't remember our conversation, except that it was strained. I was realizing that I had spent eight years of my life idealizing her. I did not even know enough about her to ask intelligent questions about her life and her plans.
Most of all, as beautiful as she still was, her physical beauty no longer gave me the kind of motivation that had once pushed me out of my comfort zone for her.
I vaguely recall that I mentioned I might be returning to Japan, and she seemed unimpressed with the idea. Likewise my academic interests. She was proceeding in her study of childhood education, and, ironic as it is, that held no interest for me at the time. Church never came up, and I became sure our differences in religion were as much a barrier to her as they were to me.
I'm not sure what I expected, but there was no voice of angels telling me to fly in the face of logic and continue my pursuit of her. Just evidence that we had never had much in common and were apparently headed in different directions.
We didn't even talk about having lunch together, just said goodbye, and I went back to get my stuff and talk a bit more with Rodrick between his classes, then headed home.
Still, every now and then, I wonder whether I made a mistake in letting the differences be too much of a barrier.
The lack of Japanese courses at Texas Tech pretty much decided me against applying there.
My mom suggested I take the newspaper route back over, and we went to the Odessa American offices and made the arrangements, so I'd have money for books and materials and a little dating.
And I registered for classes -- general ed that would transfer to the four-year school, and electronics classes -- and bought books. I didn't want to repeat things I'd learned in high school, and the school let me skip the classes I thought I was good on, so I skipped the basic electronics classes and went straight to amps and microprocessors.
They did warn me I might run out of classes to get the Associate's degree in Electronics, but the counselor and I discussed substitutions, and thought it would work out.
The microprocessors class used the 8080, which was disappointing, but the teacher was a friend of my dad's and agreed that I could use the 6800, if I could get the necessary parts.
Chapter 3 -- Christmas Present -- Micro Chroma 68
[Backed up at .]
[JMR202001042059: End.]
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