Mark Nakatani:  

Folks and Fellow Classmates, The time has sure blown by (more than flown by) since our high school graduation ceremony at the Rose Bowl in June 1974. Back then, I was young, naïve, dumb, immature, wet-under-the-collar, ready to head out into the big, new world, and seeing all the many, many years ahead of me. Now, I am much older, naïve, immature, wetting my pants more (need the Depends), buried many times by the big, cruel world, and seeing all the many, many years slip by me. See any real improvements or changes in those forty years? LOL. In those intervening 40 years, many events have transpired in my life as, I'm sure, have occurred in yours. Went to college via way of PCC and wound-up at UCLA as a transfer student pursuing a degree in Astronomy. But I wasn't able to hack the physics classes there as it was difficult to grasp physics from some of those professors in a Chinese dialect. I wasn't there to learn Mandarin or Cantonese. So, I wound up going back to PCC to figure-out a change in majors. By chance, I took some programming classes and found that I had a knack there, so transferred to Cal Poly Pomona as a Computer Science major and received my BS degree there. Later in the 90s, I received my MS degree in Computer Science from CSUF. I've been working in the IT industry as a mainframe systems programmer for 32 years and am still working in the field as a DB2 and IMS systems programmer. I'm currently working for an outsourcer company with headquarters in India. Early next year, I'm targeted to travel to India to cross train my counterparts there. Will be my first time in India. Maybe, I'll get a extra part in Slumdog Millionaire 2. LOL. Hopefully, I don't teach my counterparts there too well, so they can eventually takeover my position for 50 percent less than my overinflated US salary. LOL. I got married in the late 80s and moved down to the OC where I lived for 20 years. Unfortunately, my marriage went sour during its seventeenth year and my wife and I separated with our marriage eventually ending in divorce which finalized in 2009. Fortunately, we have a son, Kevin, from our marriage, which wound-up being the best outcome. Kevin lives with roommates and is still meandering his way through college. Recently, he's beginning to realize that he has to buckle down in college by focusing and studying hard. He realized that he doesn't want to prepare dessert at Yogurtland for the rest of his life. I'm glad the light bulb finally clicked-on inside his head and he achieved some enlightenment. It had to come this way vs. nagging or pestering him about this from me. The turbulence and difficulties of the last years of my marriage were the low point of life and the subsequent divorce forced me onto a new and uncharted path in life. I moved back to my roots in the Pasadena area (which I never thought I would return to). and eventually purchased a place in Monrovia in 2010. I am happy to say that life has been treating me well post-divorce and I am in a much better place now and enjoying life once again. But the break-up of my marriage and subsequent divorce did teach me several lessons - not to take things for granted, that life is constantly changing and impermanent (a major teaching in Jodo Shinsu Buddhism), and that one must be be flexible, open, and adaptive in life. But I do have to give credit to a very supportive family (my folks and sister and brother-in-law) and a network of close friends for being there during those tough times. They were my life line. In particular, I have to thank Rev. Unno, a Buddhist priest whom my father knew and introduced to me during a time I was having problems during the early part of my marriage. He was generous of his time, listening, and wisdom in the 22 years that I have know him. And I also have to mention, a co-worker Steve, that I became close with. He was also very generous of his time and used to listen to me pour out my emotions for hours. I a way, what I was going through at that time was similar to experiences he had gone through with his marriage. So, we were kindred spirits. I was sad to find out that Steve passed away from a heart attack just several months ago. I also have to single-out a family member, Uncle Sei, m...Expand for more