Paul Bohman

Some basics and/or trivia

• Hair color: darkish blond with a hint of red sometimes, especially in the sunlight
• Eye color: subdued green with some bluish tones
• Height: 5' 9" on a good day
• Brothers: 5; Sisters: 1
• Favorite color: Puce (ok, not really, but it is fun to say)
• Places I've lived: Virginia (Fairfax), Utah (Provo, Ogden, Logan), Argentina (Córdoba), California (San Diego)
• Countries I've visited, by region:
  • North America: United States (to the best of my knowledge I've been in all but 6 states: Alaska, Vermont, New Hampshire, Maine, Louisiana, and Tennessee), Canada, Mexico
  • South/Central America & the Carribean: Argentina (lived there for two years), Dominican Republic (humanitarian project), Peru (at night in the airport...it really doesn't count)
  • Europe: Austria, Belgium, Czech Republic, Denmark, France, Germany, Italy, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, Netherlands, Poland, Sweden (at night for half an hour in a train station), Switzerland, Vatican City (Holy See).
  • Asia: Japan
  • Pacific: Australia
• Favorite forms of exercise: Hiking, riding my bike, ultimate frisbee, playing with my niece and nephews
• Favorite authors: too many to count, but I'll start the list with Ralph Waldo Emerson and Walt Whitman; I am definitely going to have to return to this list later.

A brief history of some aspects of my life

January 1, 2006

I just moved back to the Northern Virginia area after being in Utah for much longer than I ever thought I would be. I most of my teen years in Northern Virginia (Fairfax, to be precise...or just outside the city limits of Fairfax to be even more precise), though my childhood was spent in San Diego, where I loved to play touch football in the street or "stuntman" in the back yard or in the gully behind our back yard. I was lucky to have great neighborhood friends and plenty of siblings to keep me company. I also spent plenty of time on my own, reading and drawing. Mostly drawing. In eighth grade my family moved to Fairfax for a year, then back to San Diego. At that point my parents decided they wanted to move back to Fairfax permanently, so they did.

I left Fairfax to go to college at Brigham Young University. After my freshman year, I served a two-year mission in Argentina (for the church with the inconveniently long—but meaningful—name of "The Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints", more commonly known by the nickname "the Mormons"), then returned to Utah, where I graduated with my bachelor degree in psychology (with art and Spanish minors), moved to Ogden for two years, then to Logan for seven years. Along the way I acquired a masters degree, a piano, a house, many books, and some experience in home remodeling, with a couple of scars to prove that I learned by doing.

I never thought I'd make a living in the technology arena. Of course until recently, nobody thought they'd grow up to specialize in the internet "when they grew up," because the internet was not a part of hardly anybody's life. The internet, or at least the World Wide Web part of it, didn't exist. I didn't even really learn to use a computer until I returned from Argentina, when I was 21 years old. Some friends in my ward (local church congregation) donated an old laptop to me. It was old even at the time they gave it to me. It had a whopping 25 megabytes on the hard drive, total. It had a blue and white monitor, and could not run Windows, though I tried to force it to. It's amazing to think that I was actually able to install Windows 3.1—albeit a stripped down version—on a computer with only 25 megabytes. Somehow it almost worked. What didn't work was the monitor. For whatever reason, Windows and my monitor did not get along very well. Windows seemed to work, except that everything went dark at the moment that Windows finished loading. I think Windows was still running, but who knows. I certainly didn't have the expertise to fix the problem, so I reverted back to the original DOS interface. It was on that computer that I began to learn what a computer was and how to type documents using WordPerfect 5.1.

Perhaps in some ways I can trace my career path back to that gift. Without that computer I might not have become interested enough even explore technology. After all, throughout my life I had been known as an artist. I loved to draw, to paint, to sculpt, and to imagine creative thoughts. My parents once sent me to a week-long art summer camp in the hills outside of San Diego. My senior year in high school I was voted the best artist in every possible category, with the exceptions of photography and sculpture (there were something like 14 categories). I began my studies at BYU as an art major, but that's not how I finished. I wonder what my art teachers would think of the fact that I traded my art for a degree in psychology. To be honest, I wonder what I myself think about that, or what I should think about that. I worry sometimes that I've betrayed a part of myself that I should have nurtured more.

I had my reasons for pursuing a different path. My mission in Argentina changed me. I dealt with rejection on a daily basis. I saw poverty like I had never seen before. I struggled at times to find the purpose in what I was doing. But most of the time I felt very purpose-driven. I had a message to share that I considered bigger and more important than I ever would be. I was giving of myself in ways that I never had before (and, unfortunately, never have since, in some ways). I pushed myself to be as unselfish as possible and as dedicated as possible. It was an amazing period of my life.

When I returned, I was fluent in Spanish and wiser for my experiences. Whereas my grades had been mediocre during my (very fun) freshman year at college, I achieved nearly straight A's afterwards. I taught myself to play the piano and to compose music. I had learned that I should set high goals and work toward them.

And yet I was still young and naive in many ways. I could swing between idealistic optimism and bewildering discouragement too easily. The goals of my mission had been quite clear to me, but the goals of my life after my mission were aggravating vague. I wanted to treat my life as if it were a mission, with a clearly-defined path that would make the world a better place, wherein I would play a central role of some sort, not for the acclaim it would bring but for the sense of purpose it would give me. I dabbled in the health sciences, including dentistry, physical therapy and medicine. I took nearly all of the pre-med classes, but in the end I never applied to medical school. The short version of that story is that I finally figured out that my motives for being a physician weren't all the right ones. Not only that, but I realized I'd be happier doing other things because they suited me better and took better advantage of my personality and strengths.

The chance to specialize in web accessibility happened somewhat accidentally, or at least circumstantially. I was working at Utah State University as a graduate assistant at the Center for Persons with Disabilities during my masters program. Cyndi Rowland and Tim Smith, my bosses at the time, had written a grant related to web accessibility that received funding just at the moment that Tim found at the Center for the School of the Future. I applied for the position of Technology Specialist on the grant and was hired. During my years with WebAIM (the name we chose for the grant-funded project), I've come to know the technologies that drive the internet, and I've gained an appreciation for the challenges faced by people with disabilities, both with the internet and with other aspects of their lives.

Focusing on web accessibility has given me at least part of the sense of purpose that I was seeking. It has allowed me to make a living and to feel that my efforts directly benefit other people as well. I am now in the process of completing a doctorate in Curriculum and Instruction through Utah State University. My area of emphasis is "Schooling, Culture, and Society." My dissertation will focus on barriers faced by people with disabilities in developing countries in their efforts to obtain a postsecondary education. The section of my site entitled "My PhD Saga" contains more information about that side of my life. By the way, you can contribute to my dissertation research fund if you feel so inclined. It would definitely help me out.

There's plenty more to learn about me beyond what I've written here, but this is probably too long of an introduction already. I congratulate you if you've read this far—or perhaps I should offer my condolences or apologies. At any rate, now you know a little about me.

Things I've accomplished that I'm at least sort of proud of

• I ran a marathon in September of 2003. I never thought I could do it. I didn't even want to do it. But for some crazy reason I signed up for it and pretended to train for it (I could have been much more diligent than I was; My longest run ever before the actual 26.3 mile marathon was a meager 12 miles or so. I more than doubled my best run ever when I ran the marathon. I didn't win or anything; not even close. My official time was 4:59:59, I think. I can't find the link to the time charts at the moment. My only goal was to finish, which I did.
• I taught myself to play the piano. I had some help along the way, but most of the effort was on my own. I'm no concert pianist, but I do enjoy playing. Sometimes I'm more diligent at practicing than at other times. I've slacked off recently, but I still play occasionally.
• (More to come later)