A Work in Progress...

 

Dave Verban was born in the Early 1960's in West Allis, Wisconsin.  City of Homes and Industries.  Home to industrial giants like Allis Chalmers, Kearney and Trecker.  Birthplace of notable figures such as Liberace, Harvey Kuenn, Chet Bell.  It was a bucolic time, but the roiling clouds of change were on the horizon.

 

Before he turned 5, Dave's Mama and Papa uprooted the family and moved from the mean streets of West Allis to the verdant lawns of New Berlin.  The Summer of Love was in full bloom.  There, the next 12 years passed quickly by, as Dave claims to remember little from his undoubtedly idyllic childhood.

 

He emerged from the 70's with a clean police record (thanks to his cousin Royce), a trombone, and really long hair, and decamped for Waukesha.  The "36th Best Small City in the Country." It was a short trip.  Les Paul.  Sigmund Snopek.  Da Bodeans.  There, he took up residence at Wisconsin's Pioneer college: Carroll College (not to be confused with the one in Iowa that Jesse Torres remembered).  He spent 4 slightly more eventful years at Carroll, studying the liberal arts, working in radio, pumping gas, and failing to identify anything resembling a career goal.  He left Carroll in 1985 with a degree in Psychology, a haircut, a CD player and 2 CDs, a bigger trombone, and a minor hangover.

 

From there Dave moved east, to Pittsburgh.  Iron City.  Steel Town.  The Renaissance City at the confluence of the Allegheny, Monongahela, and Ohio Rivers.  The Golden Triangle. The Hill. The O. Fred Rogers. SPUDS. Harold Betters. Myron Cope.  Matt Torres and Michael Cross.  18 months passed quickly, as did a lot of that Iron City (and IC Light).  One day, Dave woke up in his cockroach-infested little east campus apartment and realized he had no desire to be a social psychologist.  And he also had a mild hangover.  So he returned to Wisconsin, with no more than what he left with and the same trombone, although he made a net profit of about $500 on the deal.  Beer and pizza were much cheaper in those days.

 

Years (ok, weeks) of tumult followed.  Dave drove a school bus, worked as a keeper at a sheltered workshop, and hawked beer at County Stadium.  Eventually Dave landed in Madison, at the University of Wisconsin, where he talked his way into a Masters Degree in Special Education.  He lived with Larry and Dave, in the back bedroom.  He played trombone with Phil Gnarly and the Tough Guys.  And he finally decided on some productive work.  Thus was born a rewarding, if somewhat uneven, career in human services.

 

 

After ten years in which Dave ran 2 non-profit agencies (one of them nearly completely off the road), another change.  Maybe it was the long hours in the kitchen at IHOP.  Perhaps it was that curse that Marjorie Lee laid on him in 1991. Whatever the reason, his penance was several months of unemployment, regret, and stints as a seasonal worker in the housewares department at Marshall Fields and the in-school detention supervisor at a Middle School.  (Today, he regrets that cell phone camera technology was not available to him at that time.)

 

Then it was on to his next adventure, in which he parlayed an old college friendship into a cushy job with a previously reputable consulting firm.  Now Dave began to ply his trade throughout Wisconsin, bringing quality improvement to Medicaid long-term care programs.  Visiting program participants in their homes to learn about their lives.  Analyzing program data to help managers understand how to drive improvement from within.  And slowly but surely losing his sanity.

 

Then came a fateful day, when Dave visited Gloria (not her real name), a woman living in southwest Wisconsin.  Gloria had a myriad of challenging health conditions, and many interventions and supports were required to allow her to remain safely in her own home.  When Dave visited her to talk about her life, and the services she received, all Gloria wanted to talk about was the massage therapist who came to her home twice per month.  Despite all the family members and nurses and home health and personal care and chore workers who helped Gloria every day, the person who was having the most profound and personal impact was her massage therapist.

 

Flash forward several years - Dave's been working part-time, and cultivating a reputation as a stay-at-home dad and PTO gadfly.  He was becoming a little numb and cranky - too many years doing work that failed to satisfy and feed the soul. An opportunity arose.  Dave's long-suffering wife said, "stop your belly-aching and decide what kind of work would make you happy.  And go do it!"  Or something to that effect.  So, remembering Gloria, and the impact that massage had on her life, it was off to massage school.  He missed an entire season of Packer games, spent long hours studying bones and muscles and joints and actions; Qi and blood, 14 primary Meridians, 5 Elements and 8 Questions; and learned that there was indeed work out there that didn't leave him in a constant state of irritation.

 

Perhaps the most important part of Dave's Massage School Adventure was getting outside of the rather small circle of friends and co-workers that he had settled into.  He met and got to know a whole bunch of people who he never would have otherwise met.  He made new friends.  He learned about different perspectives on life and living; that there are many, many ways to approach health and well-being.

 

So now Dave is trying to break from the past, and move toward his future, living each day on its own merits.  Boy, it's hard.  Money, insurance, expectations, obligations, fear - they all work against our instincts to follow our energies.  And it's hard to get up early enough to get a jump on all the stuff that makes its way on to the "to-do" list.  Winning the lottery would be easier, but this way is much more interesting.

 

What is so funny about peace, love, and understanding, anyway?