My Ramblings

Looking through my computer files today, I ran across the following item I wrote. It reminded me of two things. First, the brevity of life and the uncertainty of knowing how long we are going to live. Second, the importance of following through with our plans to do things we say we're going to do.  Remembering Dan Rice By Stan Faddis Retired Santa Clara County Probation Officer, Dan Rice, passed away March 25, 2007.   Upon my promotion from Group Counselor to DPO II and getting assigned to the North Delinquent Unit in 1997, I was trained by Dan. Several people had told me that he was “grumpy” and “hard to deal with.” I found that under that tough exterior there was a very nice and compassionate man as well as an experienced officer who truly cared about the minors. We had a good friendship, which included quite a bit of joking around. Dan once told me, “Stan, I have forgotten more about being a probationer officer than you’ll ever know!”  Dan was a great mentor an

I’ve had two pleasantly surprising experiences this past couple of weeks, both involving letters I wrote. Both were written to men, one of whom I used to work with and know very well, the other to a man I  was acquainted with in high school.  He is a year or so older than me so I do not know him very well. I have known the the first guy, who I will call Brad, for more than twenty years. We both worked in Juvenile Hall at the time and were only slightly acquainted for the first several years. Before I go further, I need to take a rabbit trail. Brad was a Supervisor and I was a Probation Officer who took as many overtime shifts as I could get. During a phase of building a new wing to Juvenile Hall, a worker on a backhoe broke a water line to the gymnasium. This rendered the fire sprinkler system inoperable, so someone had to be in the gym to call the Fire Department should the empty structure spontaneously burst into flame. I was called several times to cover the 11 p.m. to 7 a

I took a look at Daniel’s Facebook today. It’s still active and people sometimes write on it. The below comments are a few I wanted to post here today. The first one is by one of Daniel’s buddies regarding his service to our country. The others are by his sisters.  August 27, 2013 - William Barrera: Man you were one fired up dude. The energy and the drive was there, plus you understood others very well, a trait I admired greatly next to the character you possessed that you would compromise for nothing and being solid in your own virtues. Keep watching my six from that overwatch you're on right now. Rest in power brother.  Gun Range - Bahrain, circa. 2004 August 21, 2013 Holly: Hi brother. We found out today I'm having a boy! Wish you were here to celebrate with us and meet him. I love you! August 3, 2013 Heather: Hey Butt head. Another birthday for me. The big 2-8. It's weird to think that today I reach the age you never got past. Especially with

We have a framed photo of Daniel that has a large white mat around the picture. One of the girls had put it together to take to his memorial service so that folks could sign it in his memory. I have never paid much attention to it before today. I don't know why. Maybe it was a subconscious decision to protect my heart from more hurt, or maybe I just wasn't interested in reading the comments, or maybe I wasn't yet ready to see what people had to say. Anyway, today it caught my eye as it sat there on the floor leaning against his gun safe. I picked it up, sat down on a chair, rested it on my knees and read what people wrote on June 30, 2012.   I alternated between looking at my son's have face and reading those comments. Needless to say, I began to cry a little as I read and looked at my boy, remembering his short life, his humor, his seriousness, his desire to be a protector of the weak, and the hole in my life that his passing has left in it.  The comments are deepl