One Page Sketch of Some Strong
Memories
– not reflected in my CV
by Greg Kagira-Watson
Grew
up happily on the outskirts of a small town in rural Oklahoma with
horses, cattle and bee hives. Our horse pasture behind our back yard
connected to my grandfather's cattle ranch and dairy farm. Raised
a pet crow that learned to talk
and had
his own obituary in the city newspaper. Started a real school-newspaper with a staff, in
the sixth
grade that made news in the city paper. Won
a
city-wide high jump competition in a track meet. Visited a
Federal
penitentiary with my attorney father & saw the electric
chair. Worked as a Page in the Oklahoma State House of Representatives. Burned a
marijuana field with
the police, when my dad was assistant District Attorney. Won a national science fair award for an electronics
project in
High School. Dug ditches, with a shovel, for a
construction
company—one summer job. Worked on the
maintenance crew
in a glass factory one summer. "First chair" trumpet
player in High School. Played competition tennis
on High
School team. Skydived
into the High School on the last day. Had
a 5 A.M. paper route in Dallas. Won a national
skydiving
competition in college.
As a sophomore in
college I came upon a
group of students outside a 10 story dormitory and observed the
mob-instinct
quickly surface as they yelled “jump” to the disturbed young man on the
ledge
outside a 10th floor window. Thank God I
was not caught up in this hypnotic frenzy and maintained my wits about
me. When the man splattered his brains on
the
sidewalk right in front of us my fellow students were instantly able to
regain
their wits and realize what they had done.
They will always live with the question whether their lack of
compassion—their complicit disregard for human life—encouraged the man
who felt
no love from them. My roommate and
others vomited on the spot. A young girl
who had been yelling “jump” threw herself on top of the man’s body as
if to
cover her dastardly deed. Some time later
I imagined what it must have been like at Kent
State to see fellow students
who had
protested the Viet
Nam
war lay dead on the ground. The Buddhist
monks, seated in a full lotus position, who were burning themselves
alive in
the streets of Saigon to protest the
war made
more sense to me than the suicide I had just witnessed.
Both were avoidable. I thought that
the world was going crazy and
I did not want to go. I went back to my
dormitory, immediately packed my bags, dropped out of college and began
my
search for the meaning of life—answers to the question of man’s
inhumanity to
man. My happy childhood was over.
Not long after I had a "near
death" religious experience that changed my life.
Afterwards, studied
comparative
religion, the varieties of religious experience, and the psychology of
religious
experience. Learned
both directly and indirectly that the greatest danger to a man is his
own “ego.”
Worked as a mail carrier
for Warner Bros. in California. Met 5 well-known
movie stars.
Worked as a grocery-store stocking boy.
Was
robbed and beaten to an inch of my life in the streets of San Francisco by a gang of youths while bystanders looked
out their
windows above the sidewalk as I yelled for help. Summer
work as a skydiver for a Water Ski Show in Wisconsin. Fasted for two
weeks to
protest the Viet Nam war. Dinned with richest and poorest in the world. Walked
13 miles
through
the desert to the Benedictine "Monastery of Christ in the Desert" (Abiquiu, New Mexico) and
lived there for three months as a non-Catholic, soul-searching and
studying Teilhard De Chardin,
et. al.
Served as tour-guide
into remotest regions of Mexico and later as a tour-guide in Israel, traveling the entire country--30
days. Worked as a hospital nurses' aid and a
cab driver as steps in
preparation to become an ambulance driver. Carried
a woman whose tumor weighed more than she did. Alone,
first time
in ER ambulance, tended a murder victim who died in my arms, after being stabbed
in heart with a butcher knife by his wife-- as he lay sleeping before breakfast. Lived in a trailer on an Indian reservation while worked
in
Santa
Fe hospital as a certified Emergency Medical
Technician. Was a
Christian youth
minister for "Partners in Prayer"—a
inter-denominational church in Ft.Worth, recommended to me by my
Presbyterian minister—before I became the first Baha'i in my
Oklahoma home town, at age
22. I may have been the first white person to
have a black
college
roommate off campus in my "Southern" home town. Saw a
cross burned on a hill behind my house after hosting, in our home, the
first
publicly-advertised race-amity meeting in our small college town—though
I think it was a prank. Though racially divided there was no physical
violence in our town and we never really feared it. Credited
with the capture of an armed
robber in a restaurant in
Dallas. Sold cars to get a
new, free,
dealer car to drive. Helped dig a grave by hand in a pauper's field, in
Dallas, for a
black woman too
poor to afford a funeral. While going
to college
simultaneously worked in a Burger King and as a night watchman for a
Massachusetts trucking company while
taking
college courses during the day.
After learning to drive from truckers while I was on that night
watchman job, I
drove semi-tractor trailer trucks (“18 wheelers”) for three months in
Texas—as a
college summer job. Drove
a motorcycle from Texas to Calif. With the mechanic, rebuilt an engine in an airplane that
I bought
and then flew it across the United States. Trained as a midwife and facilitated
two home
births, and also those of my own two daughters with a physician in a
birth
center. After my wife was left quadriplegic from car accident I
kept her
at home and was nurse to her for three years. Raised
our one year old daughter by myself until I
remarried four
years later. Sued the City of
Lexington to keep that same daughter in high school
and won pro se, setting new precedent for
residency requirements in Massachusetts. This inspired
her to become an
attorney. (She graduated from law school in
2006.) Re-married.
Owned a computer
company for seven years. Together with my wife,
taught 2nd daughter to read as well
as a seven year old, when she
was two. Was invited
to debate Dr. Benjamin Spock on Boston TV.
Presented a overview of the Baha’i experience in
international
development (SED) at
the United Nations on behalf of the International
Baha'i community. Lived and traveled in a motor home
for
a year,
working as an educational consultant for the Council for Global
Education, in
Washington, D.C.. Survived one airplane
crash and two
forced landings. Climbed the tallest
mountain in
the U.S. Visited the integrated schools in Northern Ireland and met political prisoners.
Appeared on CBS-48 Hours
while serving as liaison between youth from
Columbine High School and the United Nations
of Youth at
The
Hague in 1999. Lived in the home of a
prosecutor at the World Court while he was preparing
the
indictment against Slobodan Milosevic, former President of Serbia. Informally represented the
Baha’i
Faith,
at the request of Bawa Jain, a leader within the Jain religion
and organizer of the interfaith
prayer vigil at The Hague Peace
Appeal 1999. Traveled around Africa
with my Kenyan wife to some locations where children had never seen a
white
person. Slept in a tent in the Tsavo
with lions outside. Taught epistemology and science in a rural Kenyan school
one summer
as a guest teacher. Studied alternative energy systems and
built a
solar/wind powered fresh water well. Witnessed adults’ lives
become
transformed as a facilitator of transformational learning – both
secular and
religious. Encountered the false dichotomy between
intellect
and spirit. Obtained
second masters degree in Education at Harvard in route to my doctorate there. Bought 120 acres with a mountain range on a
beautiful lake in the Adirondacks and started a commercial development project
there. Helped my father to die in Oct.2002
and
delivered the eulogy at his funeral in the Presbyterian church
where I grew up, preceded by a 200 slide PowerPoint presentation I
created of
his life. Recruited an
“A-Team” of filmmakers to make a film for PBS on “Education for Peace.”
Wrote a book on World Citizenship Education, based on my doctoral dissertation.
Served as the volunteer property manager of the Baha'i Unity Center in Atlanta.