Chapter 1 - A Little Background
Chapter 1 | The Family
I fell in love at first sight. It was all over for me, but I had to convince her, and I didn’t even know her name.
The summer between my Junior and Senior year at University I was living inside my mothers garage interning at Intel as a programmer. Now for some of you that might sound like a cool thing, Intel, garage, freedom, etc. But the garage was always damp and cold, badly lit and my bed was a mattress on the floor. Oh and it turns out that Intel doesn’t pay all that well for a temp summer job – but I was grateful because many of my friends didn’t even have a job for the summer, or it wasn’t one that they could put on their CV for later. It may sound like I’m complaining here but I’m not. In retrospect it was great. I knew I was going to save enough to finish my last year at University, my expenses were virtually nil, and there was an active social life there.
Back in the mid 80’s, 1980’s, young people actually went out for the soul purpose of meeting other people their own age. There were no App’s for that – no anonymity in that day and age – you knew who was speaking with you or about you because they did it to your face. That’s how we found out if we liked someone, simple right.
I first saw the love of my life at a Church dance. Though it would take another 5 weeks before I summoned the courage to ask her to dance. When I finally did, she ask “what took you so long?” I guess while I was checking her out, she’d been checking me out.
So we began seeing each other every single day. Sometimes you just know when things are right. Now this might seem crazy to many, but I was headed back to University in just a couple of weeks. With that in mind, before I left back to finish my last year, I gave her a promise ring. Yes it was a very teeny tiny ring. She accepted.
Halfway through my Senior year we got engaged. We couldn’t stand to be apart. Again, this might seem crazy to many but I left before graduating or finishing up my studies, so we could get married. It would take a full year before we were able to save up enough to return so that I could finish my degree. After that the plan was, well we didn’t really have a plan so we were sort of playing it by ear.
We have a strong faith, and there are a few things we are very thankful for. One of these beliefs is that Families are Forever. That marriage is and can be eternal, as well as the family being together as well. Over the course of our marriage, now going into our 34th year, we have been blessed with four wonderful children (three girls and one boy.) You’ll notice I said wonderful and not perfect. (ha) When it comes to our son I sort of feel sorry for the woman who marries him only because with three sisters he’s seen it all – so it’ll be harder to fool him than most men.
Our oldest child was five when the ‘change’ occurred. She was also the first one to experience the Daddy Trips, though it wasn’t the first trip any of them had been on. The first camping trips started when they were still in diapers. Her first trip was when she wasn’t even a year old.
That’s our oldest Aleesha & me - in Glacier National Park along the edge of St. Marys Lake checking out the drift wood & rocks. You may remember her as she beat Cancer! (no small thanks to many of you amazing collectors and something the entire Lough Clan will never forget!)
The Daddy trips have become a staple in all our children’s memories and range from simple one-week trips, to entire summer trips. Each trip consisted of just two of us going out alone into the wilderness on an extended trip. Imagine being able to share the stunning beauty of the world with your child one on one. It still remains as some of my fondest memories with my children. Of course we went on family backpacking trips as well. I don’t recall a summer where we missed taking a trip. My greatest hope is that they all do the same with their children, when they have them.
Here we all are, the youngest in the pack carrier is about to turn 21, I can hardly believe it - we all look so young and happy.
Chapter 1 | Education
My Grandma Lula apparently recognized my natural math abilities when I was just two. No record of how she did that was never told to me, but it turns out she was right. My mother had me doing flash cards at four and by the time I was in kindergarten I was doing multiplication and division. The bottom line is…I’m a geek.
Now one might think that with all this early training someone along the line would have asked me what I planned on being when I grew up. No one did to my recollection. During my senior year in High School, the question was finally asked. I had no idea, I was a free living, loving, enjoying teen who hadn’t really spent a lot of time thinking about my ‘future’. It turns out that might not have been the best thing, but it was, as my children would say, ‘what is was’. College wasn’t even in the plan originally, but my fathers lengthy military career offered us children a virtually free education if we wanted though we had certain grade level requirements to keep that gift. OK it was off to college then. Hmmmm what to study, major, I wonder. Perhaps I should study math.
During my sophomore year, as part of general requirements, it was necessary to take a course in sadistics, oops, I mean, statistics. Perhaps you too have suffered the indignity of not knowing what a Mode is? There I was sitting through the course and the most surprising thing happened.
While majoring in Mathematics it became apparent I was headed toward being a Professor. At least that is what I thought since I couldn’t think of much else given I was a theorist, aka a geek at the highest level. (ha) However during that statistics course my eyes were opened to the possibilities of what I could do with all my math skills. It turns out it was anything I wanted. So I decided to switch majors, while minoring in math. Now there was a purpose to all my math, now there was direction.
The break taken during my senior years last semester had me returning to finish, having just been married. On my return I put my nose to the grindstone and worked harder than I ever had before. Only three weeks into the semester the Dean of the College called me into his office. He was curious to know how things were going and to welcome me back. In my mind everything was just fine. Or so I thought.
Another few weeks went by and again I was called back into the Deans office. This time he was a little more direct. Apparently, although I had been doing well before taking that semester off, I hadn’t been doing as well as I was now. He let me know that all my professors had tagged me as being outstanding, a changed man. I was acing all my classes and this was a profound difference than before. He asked me “where did you go during your time away?”, my answer was simple, at least to me it was, “I went home, fell in love and got married.” Seemed a simple thing to me as it never gave me a second thought. “Oh! That’s it! You’ve become serious about life, your future and the care required to be a honorable husband and eventually father.” Um, how does one respond to a statement like that? For being such an intellect, sometimes it can be humbling to have someone else open your eyes. I was dismissed with a congratulations and a ‘keep up the good work’.
A couple more weeks passed, just a few more yet to go and I’d be finished with my Bachelors Degree in Statistics with a Minor in Mathematics. Again, the Dean called me into his office. “Rodney, have you ever thought about staying on for a Masters Degree?” Was he kidding me?!, of course not, we had plans – not sure what those were really, but we were going to go out and do something great. “I’d like for you to take the entrance exams into the program, ok?”, he asked. He was relentless, I acquiesced and took the two exams. One exam was on Theory and the other was on Application. Afterwards I was called back into the Deans Office. At this point I started to realize that the professors in the College of Statistics were really trying to do something wonderful for me, though I would not realize if for another year or two.
“Have you ever heard to the Brigham Young University Outstanding Achievement Scholarship before Rodney?” the Dean asked. ‘Scholarship’ had never been part of my vocabulary, so no, I had never heard of it before. The Dean proceeded to inform me that I had passed with flying colors, both exams. He then said something I’d never ever expected…”We put your name in for the Scholarship, and it’s yours if you’d like it.” That was very much a surprise to me, so I had to ask “What does that mean?” “It means your tuition & books will be fully covered and we will give you a position in the Lab, it pays $25/hour.” That was a big offer, that would, require a consult with my consultant.
LeeAnna asked me two questions; How long would it take & what does it mean at the end of it all? Just over one year if I went non-stop and about another $1,000/month in pay. It didn’t even take her ten seconds. We were staying.
It would take another 7’ish years after graduation to realize that I’d end up doing what I was really good at, but it wasn’t what I loved.
Chapter 1 | Corporate Timeline
Seven years had past since University. I have an ability to distill complex ideas and convert them into very easy to understand concepts. This helped move me up the corporate ladder pretty quickly because I could interpret what the techno-geeks were saying and convert it to management speak.
Directly after graduation I received a job offer at AT&T Bell Labs, I wanted this one. But right after the offer came, they had a hiring freeze – turns out to have been a blessing in disguise. The other offer came from ICC Stuart Pharmaceuticals. I took it. $35k/year. But every tick mark meant some sort of pain another human being was experiencing in Phase III Clinical Trail Research. It was hard on me, to be completely honest and lasted only a year. I was offered a position at Bear Creek Corporation in Medford Oregon, working for Dr. Michael Shorland, Ph.D. Over the years I would come to love this man for his integrity and spine (he had a strong one when it came to dealing with upper managements idiocies). After nearly five years I transferred to a small consulting group out of Boulder Colorado. It was there my forced subdued passion for art would be rekindled. However It would not be realized for another year and a half. ‘Director of Database Marketing’ – this would be my last corporate position based out of Maywood New Jersey.
I’m not sure how many of you have every managed people, but in this position I was in charge of 34 direct reports in 13 different countries. It’s like herding Cats, managing people and as it turns out not much different than being in grade school.
As a leader I would hold team building get together BBQ’s at our home. You might not know this about us Lough’s, but we love to cook and we love to eat really tasty things. We’ve been told we’re not half bad, just ask any workshop attendee they’re likely to tell you about the feast we typically do at the end of each outing. So when people came over to the house and saw the personal artwork on our walls and compliment it asking “Where did you buy this, it’s stunning!” Being the frugal Scottish fellow I am, my retort was always the same, said with a smile and bit of playfulness…”Buy it!? I’m Scottish, we don’t buy things we make them, that’s me – I made that.”
The response always went something like “That’s amazing! I bet you could sell those.”
I always figured they were just being nice. After all if they ever wanted an invite back what else was there for them to say? But after hearing it a few thousand times, it started to sink in…maybe I could.
Back to, as it were, the business at hand…herding cats.