Real Life Angry Birds Gets Wired

This video that Hayden and I made a few months is linked in a new Wired article about the game!

John Max Vogel

Yesterday was the memorial for my step-father, Dr. John Vogel. I spoke during the service. Well, I mostly read a short essay I had prepared. It's not like me to extemporize.

Here's the essay.

I knew John less than ten years. Never once in that time did I greet him as Dr. Vogel, although I did introduce him to others in this manner. Even in these moments, I felt strange using this common formality.

That’s because John never introduced himself as anything other than John, and if you never stepped into his overstuffed office, full of medical journals, books, awards and diplomas, you might think he was a photographer, a collector of Japanese art, perhaps a musician.

To me, John existed only in retirement, yet he managed an exhausting schedule, taking once-in-a-lifetime trips two or three times every year. The days in between his more epic journeys he crammed with opera, food, friends, and even some work. I suppose it’s hard to retire when the world doesn’t want you to. Dr. Vogel kept up on research, edited journal articles and attended conferences long after hanging up his lab coat.

One time several years ago, while I was working at a scientific convention in Seattle, I ran into John. He was cruising down a hall at the convention center, a satchel of papers lassoed to one shoulder and his camera bag strapped from the other, marking a giant X on his chest. I closed my cellphone and approached him, a smile creeping across my face. I knew the facility was being shared by my event and another medical conference, but I never believed I would see John in the thousands and thousands of faces.

He shook my hand and unfolded his abstract booklet.

“Well, David, it seems I’ve wandered off of the right path. Perhaps you know where this room is?” He asked, completely comfortable with requesting my assistance.
“Let me take a look,” I answered, taking his map and holding it over my complete map of the facility.

I walked with him to his session, where he was ushered in by a colleague, maybe even one of you here today. I still remember the many ribbons adorning John’s badge. He was no mere exhibit hall looky-loo, as we used to call the less scientific attendees of our conference. Dr. Vogel was the real deal.

I imagine that some of you here know more about Dr. Vogel than I, and I don’t have the authority or time to attempt to tell you what he was like on the job, or list his many accolades, his numerous contributions. However, I believe it is safe to say that Dr. Vogel was, at the very least, an inspiring doctor and colleague.

I like to think that I am not easily charmed. I may smile, shake your hand, but I tend to mistrust anyone new to my world. Not so with John. In my defense, it is simply not possible to reject his charm. He was instantly warm to me, inquiring about my interests and never mentioning his own. I knew he was an accomplished doctor and teacher, but he seemed truly impressed with my utterly basic understanding of computers, something he, too, tinkered with. It was some time later that he showed me a data interface he wrote in order to evaluate a long-term research project. Suddenly, my printer installing skills seemed slightly less impressive.

Over the years, as I got to know John better, my jaw repeatedly hit the floor when he’d share with me some other achievement—his manner so off-hand, so humble. I’m not like John; I’d have my CV tattooed on my chest if it were near as glamorous as his. That’s what separates men like John from others. Not the astonishing accomplishments, nor the certificates that adorn a wall. John’s fundamental core was beautiful. He emanated all that is good about humanity. Our shared curiosity, a belief that we need to take care of each other, the necessity that all men and women be treated equally, fairly. Life was precious to John, and he carried this belief with him both professionally and personally.

He was quite conservative when I met him, but he never squashed my progressive ideas. If anything, John himself was politically overrun once he married into Jeanne’s liberal family. Jeanne, of course, is a passionate Democrat, so I’m fairly certain John, being a good scientist, hypothesized that entering a political debate with her would introduce too many variables. As we joked recently, John’s vote for Obama was probably less a vote for change as it was a vote for peace and quiet.

Having no biological children, John quipped that he skipped the hard part. In his role as Opa to Lucas, Aidan, Hayden and Morgan, John doted. He loved his grandchildren, and they absolutely adored him. I remember not long before John entered the hospital for the last time, he stubbornly hoisted himself out of bed and slowly made his way down the hallway just so he could wave goodbye to my son, Hayden.

In the course of my studies in literature, I’ve come across many American archetypes. Characters that truly embody one or more of the basic tenets of our society. As I mentioned earlier, Doctor John Vogel is the real deal, a true American archetype. Self-made, independent, loyal, generous, up to any challenge, a hint of joyful innocence always twinkling in his knowing blue eyes.

Although we spoke often of politics and life at the University of California, we only on occasion discussed literature. Knowing what I do about John and his many passions, I believe he might have been a fan of another American archetype, Ralph Waldo Emerson. In memory of John, I’d like to close with a passage from Emerson’s Nature that reminds me of him.

To speak truly, few adult persons can see nature. Most persons do not see the sun. At least they have a superficial seeing. The sun illuminates only the eye of the man, but shines into the eye and the heart of the child. The lover of nature is he whose inward and outward senses are still truly adjusted to each other; who has retained the spirit of infancy even into the era of manhood. His intercourse with heaven and earth, becomes part of his daily food.