incredible career paths with a strong chemistry background. Anyway, I had armed both boys with the ability to understand advanced math and science that seem to help them in life. Yes, I did have to do some revision work myself to relearn some of this but it was fun to do.
By the way, Ryan graduated from the University of Western Australia with first class honors in civil and structural engineering which means that he had a very high grade average. This was a remarkable achievement and we were exceptionally proud of him. His honors thesis was very cerebral and used both a physical and mathematical modeling to prove his theory for an oil and gas trenching concept.
Before his university graduation, Ryan secured employment with a great Oil and Gas company called Subsea 7. His new company invited Ryan to present this thesis at a leading industry conference in Alaska and they gladly paid for this big trip from Western Australia, via Saudi Arabia to Alaska. Ryan was sent to Paris for two weeks training and surprisingly he was the youngest graduate amongst the 150 attendees. Two more trips will take him to Scotland and Norway
Email from our very close friend Linda Morison.
“ The pictures of Ryan ' s graduation said it all- Family, Pride and Joy. Those wonderful photos came with a lot of hard work behind them- years of training, teaching and tuition of Ryan as a small child. Hours of toil for him learning such things as Calculus when other children were possibly outside playing or watching TV. You all made it possible for him to make the most of his intelligence. My first impression of Ryan when he was little, was that he was a bit ' wild '. And I ' m sure his sense of fun has not been diminished because we know how funny you two can be! But you all got him into shape and did it with love which in the end makes all the difference to a person growing up. Ryan is stepping out now, into his own adult life. Into the world of excitement, but also a world of hard knocks. And you know what? He ' ll take any punches that come his way and go onto better things because he and Luke were both rolled, soaked and marinated in positive attitudes, experiences and counsel, thanks to their parents. Their positive outlook on life has been well instilled. It will be there for them, whatever comes their way. The good and the bad.
" Success means doing the best we can with what we have. Success is the doing, not the getting; in the trying, not the triumph. Success is a personal standard, reaching for the highest that is in us, becoming all that we can be ".- Zig Ziglar. Please congratulate Ryan for us. He is going to go from strength to strength and we will all be there to cheer him on!
Love and Best Wishes
Linda for further engineering training. Interestingly, there were 600 applicants vying for only 4 engineering jobs and Ryan was successful. Two key reasons that were pointed out to him by the human resources department after he got the job were his recent knowledge and understanding of practical engineering activities as he had learned at a construction company while at university and his successful photography business that he had set up and was managing. Ryan now has a great head start to his career. Yes, there is a conflict with my passion for nature and Ryan’ s entry into the industry that rapes and pillages the earth- oil and gas industry but we haven’ t yet had that argument!
Four years earlier, Luke graduated with honors from another college called Curtin University and he has been very successful as an engineer. His first assignment was to scope, receive tenders and deliver a $ 50 million facilities contract in Western Australia that he is now completing. We gave him a very expensive pen to sign the contract with the client, Rio Tinto a large mining company. Luke has moved up the ranks in his company and is now a project engineer and has a great career.
BARRY STEVEN EPSTEIN- PhotoAutobiography DRAFT 83 of 156