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Talking Story  by Polo

Warren Noboru Suzuki, 1939-2008

From The Asian Reporter, V18, #18 (April 29, 2008), page 7.

Maybe he was a terrific teacher, I cannot say. Maybe he did extraordinary research, I wouldn’t know. In a nation of really sharp people, in our universe of super smart academics, I am lost in superlatives. I long for simpler things. For solid men.

What I can say about our dear professor, what anyone ever near Warren Suzuki knows for sure, is that this gentle man had a warm-warm voice, he had the kindest eyes.

Of course, as his students, his struggling and his superior ones, have said and said again: our Professor Suzuki was completely committed to us. To every learner’s success.

The man was relentless, endlessly generous even if, like Janet Nishihara, she wasn’t really his student, even if her doctoral dissertation wasn’t actually at his university — "I could call him," she’ll tell you, "I knew I could call him late nights and he’d explain things in ways he knew I would understand. Ways he knew I could use."

Of course, Professor Suzuki contributed consistently at both the university and the national level, at college committees, in educational associations, to professional journals.

"He was a master of all," recalls his colleague, his best friend, Professor Larry Kenneke. "He would spend untold hours preparing for issues coming before the Faculty Senate. Way above and beyond what was called for."

Of course he was all that. Committed. Stubbornly loyal to those looking up to him. Determined to serve his academic obligations at standards he quietly chalked out, he drew at places most of us won’t ever approach.

But like I was saying, his excellence, those smarts, that sheer focus, are all so far above my ken. Way beyond what each work day demands of me. My world aches along in smaller strides, in humbler expectations.

And likely this wobblier world needs no more super sharp professors, our planet has plenty. So bright. Probably, we don’t long for another crafty manager of our abundant intellectual or technological resources. Our energetic nation has so many.

I knew exactly what I needed when our Professor Suzuki shook my hand. I knew it when that gentle teacher held my eyes. We all know it. We get it immediately.

Certainly we do. He made us feel cared for. Cared for, not in loud notes, never with silly exuberance. But cared for, like by a solid man. Like by a sensei. Like how he cared for his lovely wife Carlene. Ask anyone. Ask about his determined gentleness. Warren’s stubborn tenderness.

Warren Noboru Suzuki, professor of so many at Oregon State University’s College of Education. Teacher of so many more. Teacher of care among us, of commitment to a bigger, a much-much bigger, us. Ua ola loko i ke aloha.