Reginald Eugene Ford III – 50th Reunion Essay

Reginald Eugene Ford III

610 Oakview Way

Emerald Hills, CA 94062

reg.ford@aya.yale.edu

650-576-4041

Spouse(s): Cynthia (1969)

Education: University of California, Berkeley, PhD 1976

Career: Software engineer, computer science researcher, and program leader, SRI International (Menlo Park, CA). Still work in the Computer Science Lab, but mostly retired.

Avocations: Music, gardening, art, science/math, history, books/audiobooks, running

College: Saybrook

If it was five years ago I would say a lot about my work and what it’s meant to me, but I’m essentially retired (from the computer science lab at SRI in Menlo Park, California), and the present and future are more important. I once read that an interviewer found the 96-year-old Bertrand Russell reading Plato. Asked why, he answered “To improve my mind.” That’s the way I want to grow old. Twenty-two years from first grade through grad school, some intervening years of learning on the job, now 22 years more or less for the final phase. The first 22 years prepared me for work, but not for personal interests I acquired later. Remedial education was needed. Some of that was catch-as-catch-can (e.g., wandering through art museums, building a classical music CD collection, figuring out what plants will survive northern California dry summers, families of deer, and our wretched clay soil). But after retiring (mostly) last July, it was time to get serious. I’m now in retirement “first grade” on Coursera and other MOOCs, concentrating on music (theory, composition, audio signal processing, history of classical music), neural networks/machine learning, and plant science. And since I’m getting old and waking too early, a course on sleep neurobiology and medicine seemed sensible. What a great time to retire—so many resources at our fingertips, for example, tools like Musescore to analyze scores and get a better technical understanding of how music works. A few months ago I bought an electric guitar and am working my way through some excellent online video resources for disciplined learning. Retirement “second grade”? Maybe analytical classes on drawing and painting to dig deeper into my obsession with art museums.

Some of you will remember Cynthia, whom I met at a Saybrook mixer. She retired five years ago after a decade as SRI’s chief information officer. Volunteer organizations quickly grab hold of people like her who know how to organize groups and get things done. Currently she’s working with an organization that provides volunteer services for elderly people who want to stay in their homes, and also a summer program that teaches middle and high school girls about careers in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics. Both of us lead tours at the Filoli garden. My to-date volunteering has some carry-over from work. I’ve applied logic programming tools developed by my project team to improve handling of plant collections information, and I’m a Coursera discussion forum mentor for Stanford’s Introduction to Logic class.

The past is also present. Memories of the early years are actually growing more vivid. My 50th high school reunion proved that bonds with friends I hadn’t seen for decades could rekindle. A group of us are holding regular video telecons, and finding that our childhood selves have grafted nicely with our present selves. Perhaps there’ll be similar magic in the Yale 50th reunion.