The little boy’s eyes were wide open as they often were when he laid awake in bed at night. His mother had just finished telling him a a magic sandbox story and she had begun drifting off to sleep. He loved the magic sandbox stories because he was always the main character in the script. Quietly, Connor started nudging his mother, “Mom, Mom are you awake?” “Hmmmm?” she said sleepily. “Mom, Mom i have something I want you to guess!” “Okay”, she replied still only half conscious. “Mom I am better at something than anyone else. Can you guess what that is!?” She surfed her mind for some answer that might meet his excitement. “Bike riding?” Connor was known for his agility. “No Mom. I mean this is something no one else is better at.” His mom ventured her second guess. “Painting?” Connor’s art teacher raved about his creativity. “No mom. You get one more guess.” “It must be soccer,” she replied. “No mom.” “Okay, I give.” “Mom, I am better at being Connor than anyone else in the whole world.”
And indeed he was!
Being Connor included an ease with numbers. One day when he was supposed to be doing his math homework, his mother found him hanging upside down on a chair. “Connor will you please do your math homework?” “I am.” he replied. “Oh really?” she queried. “I’m thinking!” he said. Sure enough he was coming up with the answer to an algebraic equation in his head. In Connor’s world thinking upside down was the key to ending right side up.
On the other hand letters were not of much interest to Connor. In school his teacher believed Connor lacked the ability to concentrate because he didn’t listen when she was teaching the alphabet. His mother was puzzled when the teacher conveyed this because at home she knew Connor could draw and paint for hours. Upon his mother’s questioning Connor replied, “Mom words just don’t make sense.”
How could words not make sense to him? Connor could describe in detail how a microwave worked. And at four years old in the Pizza Hut, he described to the awe-struck cashier how the pizza dough machine worked, as he peeked at it from around the counter. When he would do this with clocks, escalators, merry-go-rounds etc. his sister in exasperation would exclaim, “When he talks like that it makes my brain explode!”
Although words didn’t make sense, it was easy for Connor to fit together puzzle pieces, legos, paper kites, model cars and airplanes. And he could put together chairs and tables that his mother purchased for decor. Yet he NEVER read the instructions. His dad would pressure him to follow the directions and Connor would say, “I don’t need to read the instructions dad.” For him words just confused his ability to put things together.
Connor’s curiosity would always spark a question, about anything and everything. “Mom, how does the grass grow?”
“Mom if the car moves forward will the fly in our car actually move or just seem like its moving”? One day his mother decided to reverse the questioning and she asked him “Connor who is God?” Connor stretched his arms out as far as his little fingers could reach as if to embrace infinity. Once again in Connor’s world God Itself was beyond words.
With his affinity for questioning and his disinterest in reading, it was no surprise that one of his favorite books became, “Where is Waldo?” A simple question that didn’t require words. And math and physics became Connor’s world beyond words. In school his math teacher would say, “Connor was born to be an engineer.” Well what did that mean in Connor’s world? Connor could not only calculate numbers in his head, but he could sense the concept of gravity and other physical laws of nature. It was easy for him to feel how two walls of a building were held up by leaning on the beams of a ceiling, and what it would feel like if one wall was suddenly taken away.
When Connor did become an engineer he noticed how different he was from all the other engineers. For awhile he lived in the box that the engineering world had created. But as he continued questioning he began challenging the world to meet Connor where Connor was. And `
he began sensing and perceiving the world of physics by jumping out of airplanes, surfing wild waves, climbing the Himalayas. He began riding horses, and listening to their wisdom. His body didn’t want to stay in one place nor one frame of mind. He saw the world from a multi-faceted prism. Little did his physics teacher know that Connor was really an engineer of life not just a “civil engineer”. Now any particular day you might find him in Russia, Turkey, Brazil or some other country or continent. He is a life engineer that collaborates with people to create from the energy they actually are.
One need not worry where Connor is. When he got lost in an airport as a child he was found calmly playing video games. His mother asked him, “Why didn’t you find a big person to help you find your parents?” His answer was “Mommy, I knew where I was. In asking, “Where is Connor?” nowadays , it’s a little bit like finding Waldo. You look all over the globe and then say, “Oh there he is!” And of course, Connor knows where Connor is.
Occasionally visiting home during his travels, someone will ask, “Connor don’t you get lonely traveling the world without your family and friends?” Tickled with himself, he smiles and says, “How can I be lonely? I take Connor with me wherever I go.”