by Blade Hall
He is an English teacher at PCHS. He is a husband. He is a father of three children. He is a military veteran. He is Mr. Ogle.
Mr. Ogle has served a total of six years in the U.S. military from 2000-2006 and was deployed in places like Bulgaria, Iraq, Kuwait, and Germany. While serving our country over in Iraq, he missed many unforgettable moments in his family’s life, one of which was the birth of his daughter. While he had a few weeks time here and there to spend with his first born child, he really hadn’t spent much quality time with his daughter until she was ten months old, which was when he left the military to come back to his family and become a teacher here at Paris Cooperative.
“It was great, tough at times, but I wouldn’t change a thing,” states Mr. Ogle about his time serving. He went on to relate the lessons he learned. One of these that was the most important to him was the value of spending time with his kids. He said that too many parents lose the importance of watching a movie or sitting down and playing Sorry with their kids. Now, when his kids ask him to play with them, he thinks of what it was like when he lost that time while being in Iraq and how he missed out on so much of his daughter’s first year.
So parents and future parents, I guess the life lesson here is to pay attention. Cherish those small, seemingly insignificant moments with your family; because that may be all you have to remember them by when they’re gone, whether they’ve moved away, passed on, gone to college, or been deployed to Afghanistan. In a roundabout way, this has come to a simple fact, family is everything.
“I am who I am today because of it,” states Mr. Ogle. And who is he? A inspiring teacher and a great father. To read more of Mr. Ogle’s thoughts on parenting, read his blog: My Adventures in Fatherhood
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