A Friendship Never Forgotten and Never Taken for Granted
- thepadol2
- Oct 5, 2023
- 8 min read
Never really had a chance to say goodbye to Jim Sollinger and never really had a way to do so fittingly. While this is only a small window into Jim's life, it's how I like to remember him and I'm sure he would have liked to share it as well.
Friends come in all sizes, shapes, types, and whatever else comes to mind. Some come and go. Some grow with you. To a kid, having friends is your first notion of relationships outside of family. They say boys mature much later than girls and perhaps friends in those younger years among boys tend to be superficial and more for having fun together as one explores the boundaries of what you can discover.
The Serious Side
I don't know why but even way back in 2nd grade I probably came across as a great listener and with a bit of imagination. I guess I must have been a storyteller of sorts even as a 7 year old as some of the girls tended to gravitate towards me. Then in 4th grade and moving to an all boys school it became a different ball game. In the years, Jim became a cherished school companion. It was really odd as I think from the outside we really didn't have much in common. Jim was known as an athlete as he competed in cross country running. He was naturally outgoing and easy going as well. He was never arrogant or aggressive. Good natured with an easy laugh. Still, there must have been a part of him that enjoyed our time to share reflections and questions of anything and everything in a more collected way rather than just going from one fun activity to the next. Maybe it was lunch, maybe it was during break. He would always have time for me. He never brushed me off. We were in the same classes for the most part. All of us had a variety of friends for different interests, kind of an overlapping set of circles. In class we tended to be nerds as we were in the group of kids who considered class a serious responsibility. Inevitably Jim and I would find ourselves in the same study groups.
8 Years
The record shows that Jim started as 4th grader and graduated from high school at Notre Dame International Rome (ND) from 1968 to 1976. While NDI was a mix of day students and boarders, both Jim and I were day students and on the same school bus as well. Eight years is a long time and it was also the main part of the day. We went from being children to young kids in elementary to teens in high school. Neither internet nor mobile phones were part of our things, somehow the next day became the continuation of the past day in school, almost like a channel you put on pause while you go do something else.
Jim wasn't a big kid, maybe even a tad under compared to some of his other schoolmates, but he was an athlete and had excellent stamina. He could run and did so with an enviable form for his age on the cross country team. Sometimes when looking back, it's easy to think of him as being a student of the 60's. He didn't really have long hair typical of the 70s and tended to dress conservatively with buttoned shirts and dark slacks. A little bit of that clean boy look. He never came across as a nerd although he really did have to study. His easy disposition and positive outlook probably made many overlook the heavy dark rimmed glasses.
The 1975 Spring Semester
In our junior year in high school, our English class teacher asked everyone to choose and work on a special project to be presented at the end of the semester. There weren't too many constraints so everyone could be somewhat creative. For whatever reason, Jim and I quickly agreed to do the project together. Little did I know at the time how this project would forever be a cornerstone to things I would do later on in my professional life and where it would take my interests.
An Analogue World
It was 1975 and television was still mostly black and white in Italy. We did have some exposure to small theatre musical productions. In hindsight it is remarkable that we decided to do something that would showcase "media"by incorporating "multiple" forms of visual and aural approaches Though I can't say for sure I think at at some point we started talking about it as "multi - media". We tend to associate it with digital based technology, but it really means communicating thru different ways simultaneously. At the time the term was used loosely to mean a multi-projector slide show timed to an audio track.
The Road Never Taken for Three Months
As this was an English class, we decide to provide a "multi - media" experience of Robert Frost, the pulitzer winning poet of fame. Jim and I spent three intense months on this project. It would simply be a production as if it were a movie or a musical. We spent Saturdays going to the United States Information Service (USIS) center in Rome to research what we could on Robert Frost and to select material that could be used. No internet. USIS was our only hope to find any useful information as it had US based library material. We had to learn how to manage microfiche and microfilm. Early on we decided that this experience couldn't be over 13 minutes as run time as that was our guess for audience attention span. We also probably would have run out of useful material anyways.
A Production Studio of Sorts
Having the subject matter was just the start. We then worked on a production script both in terms of what to say or narrate and something like a storyboard to understand the production sequence. This was real serious work. As 17 year olds and in high school, I think we really went to classes not really because we wanted to but because it was the means to graduate which was the ultimate objective. Perhaps we liked some classes more than others. This project, was the first time I could feel an underlying passion to create something that would be "wow", something totally unexpected by others. Jim was on the same page. I don't think we ever said it, but we were up for the challenge. We weren't turning back or giving up.
It consumed our weekends. It found its way into whatever time we had in class, breaks, and lunch, to go thru ideas and plan for activities. Who had heard of gantt charts?
Jim was dabbling in photography and he could work with 35mm slides. He began to create a library of slides with images that would work with the script. I was already sort of the techie and so I took care of the audio side, getting mics and recordings to work.
We had the main storytelling set rather quickly. The large picture was straight forward. What we became obsessed about was that it would be smooth, polished, interesting, captivating, and that it would hold the attention for 13 minutes. We re-worked the script endlessly so that each segment would flow to the next seamlessly. The music soundtrack had to work with the pictures. The narration had to tell a story or rather take the audience on an experience about Robert Frost.
Sort of Nerds
A kid that works on complex science projects is by definition a nerd. Maybe this wasn't quite a science project, but the complexity and challenges were there.
We spent Saturday and Sunday afternoons on this. It was our definition of fun at the time. In hindsight it was much more than that. As cross country runner Jim knew what it meant to be a member of an athletic team. Me instead, the most I had ever done as a team was to work on some science and chemistry exercises with a classmate, but that was momentary and fleeting at best. For this project to succeed, we had to be four hands and two heads together. It taught me what it meant to be a contributing member of team, albeit just two of us. Did we quarrel? I don't recall. We did have disagreements, but generally we ended compromising by ceding and incorporating different ideas for a better two plus two. Imagine my surprise when years later in professional life I would be on teams and people just had to compete and compromise was completely alien as a possibility.
Jim was never in rush. He really would listen. He would think. He would reflect. At times he would return to a point days later suggesting a way to support it. I really can't recall Jim ever making an upset or angry face. Maybe for an instant but it would disappear rather quickly.
A truly analog era. Audio was a mix between the soundtrack and the narration on a music cassette medium. Jim had a 35mm slide carousel for the pictures but it had to be advanced manually as we had no gear to synchronize automatically. We did what we could with what we had at our disposal. Jim had the script to queue the slide change and he did practice to do it flawlessly.
When the day came, I had Dad take me to school so that I could take the stereo for the audio portion. Jim was ready with slide carousel. We knew it would go well. It was much more. Getting applause and perceiving the admiration from classmates who normally wouldn't pay much attention was a real sense of achievement. Jim and I shared this mutual appreciation that we truly made something happen together well beyond our comfort zone.
I know Jim never forgot this experience and we could speak of it fondly. It was a lesson in many things. To me it opened my eyes to the idea of thinking outside the box, being innovative, that practice makes perfect, that details count, that working with someone who is supportive and constructive is a joy.
As a New Chapter Starts
Looking at this picture, where our respective parents organized a lunch at Rome's Chinese restaurant of the time, I have to think that Jim got his wish with contact lenses and sported a new look with the moustache, although it would never out do his perennial grin.
Once More, Last Time
This is how I will always remember Jim. Anytime I would work on a product experience, a marketing message, a presentation, or even simply look at any production, remembering Jim is never far away. It's a seamless association.
Jim was immensely liked by everyone at NDI. Heavy rimmed glasses, a well chiseled face, heavy eyebrows, eyes that were deep and honest, always a smile or at least a grin, never made anyone feel that his time was being wasted on any useless activity, curious and open, never hurried, and he always made you feel that whatever you said was interesting to him.
Somehow, by intuition or by subconscious awareness, we all knew that the time at NDI wasn't only special, but also that the friendship formed with others from so many diverse backgrounds, and that it was all really a moment in time of convergence, no one expected to really remain in close contact over the years as each one of us would probably end up in different parts of the world. In someways this is true, but with the use of email we managed to find our friends and keep some form of contact. If not for this, that we saw each other in Brussels years later would have been unlikely. 15 years later to be exact, for just an evening with his family. It was nice to see that Jim had settled down and looking forward to a fulfilling life with family.
What cards we are dealt will always remain a mystery. We made the best of the time we had.
Thank you Jim.
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