I recently wrote about Heather and Mark’s Excellent Adventure. Daughter Courtney also faces a big change in her life, one I – and her husband, Dave – can relate to; a combat assignment. Here’s a little about a hero of mine, Major Courtney Short.
Courtney was born in a little town on the prairie. the model for Carol Bly’s Rachel River, a place our story will wind its way through later. She was in the stroller at her sister’s public dance debut. (See Daughter, Actor, Scholar, Advocate)
She followed her sister to All State Choir, and onto Twin City professional stages, including Children’s Theater, the Guthrie, and Actor’s Theater. At nine, she played Annie Graving (with Craig T. Nelson and Pamela Reed) in Rachel River, a film based on the Carol Bly short stories inspired by the small town of Courtney’s birth. That’s two daughters in the Screen Actor’s Guild. Courtney played volleyball, but injury cut short that endeavor. There was student body office, music, drama, and swing dancing, that last not a school activity.
Courtney developed a love of history and writing early, announcing that she planned to go to Columbia University to pursue journalism. Doing exactly that, she enrolled in Columbia’s Barnard College, pledged Delta Gamma, played intercollegiate rugby, and earned a Bachelor in history from Columbia University, while also earning a commission in the United States Army through Reserve Officer Training Corp across town at Fordham University.
After graduation it was Ft. Bliss for training in Patriot missiles, and on to Korea to run a Patriot platoon and battery fire control. Korea was where her future appeared not to be Army at all, but rather that of an Air Force wife of a fighter pilot, before the tragic death of Lieutenant Randy Murff, whose story was told by Courtney in Determined Dreamer, Passionate Flyer.
Upon returning to the United States, Courtney commanded a Patriot battery, served on battalion staff, earned a Master’s in Management, taught at the Air Defense School at Ft. Bliss, Texas and married fellow Captain (now Major) David Short. Soon after, she accepted an appointment to the faculty at West Point contingent on completing her Master’s in history, which she did at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, completing her PhD., ABD.
She began her West Point assignment in 2008 as an instructor, and later as Assistant Professor (not everyone makes that step), in the Department of History. Promoted to Major in January 2009, her assignment to the United States Military Academy ended this past May.
In August 2009, she became a mother (and I a grandfather) to Olivia. This summer, she’s been preparing to deploy at the end of this month to Afghanistan as a staff officer of the 3rd Brigade of the 1st Armored Division. Meanwhile, husband Dave has charge of Olivia (or is it the other way ‘round?) at Ft. Leavenworth, Kansas.
Courtney, you’ll be in our thoughts every day until you are safely home.
Thursday, September 22, 2011
Thursday, September 1, 2011
Daughter, Actor, Scholar, Advocate
Heather married Mark Fields on August 13. In introducing my toast I said we were “Celebrating a bon voyage to Heather and Mark’s Excellent Adventure.” This blog reprises my remarks.
The bride and groom have each lived their own adventures before today, but now, before they embark on their next – shared – adventure, I want to tell you about some of Heather’s.
From the youngest age she was a dancer, a singer, an actor…and a bookworm.
For me, her father, two images of this little girl are etched in my mind; dancing in the aisle of a department store at about 4 years old, a photo of which landed on the front page of a small-town Minnesota newspaper, an indelible image of her creative, performing side. Second, of a little girl with big round glasses, on a small chair in a corner, with a large book, reading, her intent, intelligent, learning side.
Through her early years she seemed mostly focused on her performing side…
She was selected twice to the Minnesota All-State Choir, trod the boards in musicals – South Pacific, Annie, and plays, including Samuel Beckett’s Endgame, a State Championship One-Act. Flutist, middle school cheerleader, and still a top academic performer. Friends remember she talked about law school as early as the 8th grade.
It was theater she pursued between Delta Gamma sorority parties at the University of Minnesota. I see those DG’s are here. Still friends, and that certainly means a lot.
Heather didn’t hesitate, Gopher theater – and history – degree in hand, to head for Hollywood…Malibu, and The OC, to film, stage, child care, and waiting on tables.
There was some film including the lead in “The Layover,” (“A coming of middle-age film,” wrapped in 2001, unreleased) but it was on stage she left her mark, even in that entertainment megalopolis.
On stage she originated principal roles in three world premier plays, one the lead.
Of "A Summer with Hemingway’s Twin" (World Premier at Alternative Repertory Theater, Santa Ana) L.A. Times theater critic T.H. McCulloh wrote, Heather Kjos is marvelously restrained and real as Lila, the college student who spends her whole summer hoping to meet her literary idol. Kjos’ buoyant, wide-eyed wonder at being with the actual Hemingway family is refreshing and believable.
Of Heather’s role in "Six Random Women," Joel Beers wrote in the Orange County Weekly:
There's Miss District of Columbia (a perfectly cast, deer-in-the-headlights Heather Kjos), who sees in the Miss US of A pageant everything bright and shiny about the most wonderful, blessed-by-God nation on Earth.
That tug of the law was still there, and it finally pulled her back to Minnesota, where she took the LSAT and caught on with a Minneapolis law firm as a docketing clerk. She was good at that, good enough to garner a Chicago job for more money, then become a paralegal in intellectual property law, completing her coursework at Loyola University.
It all just whetted that appetite for law school, which sent her to St. Paul, to the William Mitchell College of Law. While there, she was runner-up in the Intellectual Property National Moot Court competition, on the IP Law Review, clerked for a professor, was published in journals, and has been listed in Westlaw. At that table are law school classmates.
She’s employed as an attorney, no small thing in this market.
Now with Mark the next, the start of many more adventures
The toast is coming in a moment, but first, this piece of doggerel:
To keep your marriage brimming,
With love in the loving cup
Whenever you’re wrong, admit it
Whenever you’re right, shut up.
I propose a toast to Mark and Heather:
Here’s to the past, for all that you have learned
Here’s to the present, for all that you share
Here’s to the future, for all that you look forward to together.
The bride and groom have each lived their own adventures before today, but now, before they embark on their next – shared – adventure, I want to tell you about some of Heather’s.
From the youngest age she was a dancer, a singer, an actor…and a bookworm.
For me, her father, two images of this little girl are etched in my mind; dancing in the aisle of a department store at about 4 years old, a photo of which landed on the front page of a small-town Minnesota newspaper, an indelible image of her creative, performing side. Second, of a little girl with big round glasses, on a small chair in a corner, with a large book, reading, her intent, intelligent, learning side.
Through her early years she seemed mostly focused on her performing side…
She was selected twice to the Minnesota All-State Choir, trod the boards in musicals – South Pacific, Annie, and plays, including Samuel Beckett’s Endgame, a State Championship One-Act. Flutist, middle school cheerleader, and still a top academic performer. Friends remember she talked about law school as early as the 8th grade.
It was theater she pursued between Delta Gamma sorority parties at the University of Minnesota. I see those DG’s are here. Still friends, and that certainly means a lot.
Heather didn’t hesitate, Gopher theater – and history – degree in hand, to head for Hollywood…Malibu, and The OC, to film, stage, child care, and waiting on tables.
There was some film including the lead in “The Layover,” (“A coming of middle-age film,” wrapped in 2001, unreleased) but it was on stage she left her mark, even in that entertainment megalopolis.
On stage she originated principal roles in three world premier plays, one the lead.
Of "A Summer with Hemingway’s Twin" (World Premier at Alternative Repertory Theater, Santa Ana) L.A. Times theater critic T.H. McCulloh wrote, Heather Kjos is marvelously restrained and real as Lila, the college student who spends her whole summer hoping to meet her literary idol. Kjos’ buoyant, wide-eyed wonder at being with the actual Hemingway family is refreshing and believable.
Of Heather’s role in "Six Random Women," Joel Beers wrote in the Orange County Weekly:
There's Miss District of Columbia (a perfectly cast, deer-in-the-headlights Heather Kjos), who sees in the Miss US of A pageant everything bright and shiny about the most wonderful, blessed-by-God nation on Earth.
That tug of the law was still there, and it finally pulled her back to Minnesota, where she took the LSAT and caught on with a Minneapolis law firm as a docketing clerk. She was good at that, good enough to garner a Chicago job for more money, then become a paralegal in intellectual property law, completing her coursework at Loyola University.
It all just whetted that appetite for law school, which sent her to St. Paul, to the William Mitchell College of Law. While there, she was runner-up in the Intellectual Property National Moot Court competition, on the IP Law Review, clerked for a professor, was published in journals, and has been listed in Westlaw. At that table are law school classmates.
She’s employed as an attorney, no small thing in this market.
Now with Mark the next, the start of many more adventures
The toast is coming in a moment, but first, this piece of doggerel:
To keep your marriage brimming,
With love in the loving cup
Whenever you’re wrong, admit it
Whenever you’re right, shut up.
I propose a toast to Mark and Heather:
Here’s to the past, for all that you have learned
Here’s to the present, for all that you share
Here’s to the future, for all that you look forward to together.
Subscribe to:
Posts (Atom)